IN   MINERS'   MIRAGE-LAND 


To  the  courtesy  of  the  editors  of  the  Los  Angeles  "Times"  and  the 
San  Francisco  "Chronicle"— in  which  publications  many  of  these  sketches 
have  already  seen  print— is  due  their  reappearance  in  more  permanent  form. 


^\BRA^ 
o-    r  ,e 

UNIVtKSITY 

or 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


by 


Idah   Meachom   Strobridge 


LOS   ANGELES 
MCMIV 


Copyright,  19O4,  by 
Idah  Meacham  Strobridge 


Printed  by  the 

Baumga^rdt  Pvibllshlng  Compevrvy 

Los  Angeles,  California. 


Of  this  autographed  edition  of 
In  Miners'  Mirage-Land,"  one 
thousand  copies  were  made;  this 
one  being  number 


RTEMISIA 

AT   TWO   THIRTY-ONE    EAST    AVENUE    FORTY-ONE,    IN    LOS    ANGEL 


TO  THE  MEN  OF  THE  DESERT; 
but  more  especially  those  miners  who 
have  grown  gray  while  waiting  for 
their  dreams  to  come  true,  I  dedicate 
these  stories  that  I  found  in  that  land 
where  I,  too,  dreamed  dreams. 


FOREWORD 

"The  palpable  sense  of  mystery  in  the  Desert  air 
breeds  fables,  chiefly  of  lost  treasure.  Somewhere 
within  its  stark  borders,  if  one  believes  report,  is  a  hill 
strewn  with  nuggets ;  one  seamed  with  virgin  silver ;  an 
old  clayey  water-bed  where  Indians  scooped  up  earth 
to  make  cooking  pots  and  shaped  them  reeking  with 
grains  of  gold.  Old  miners  drifting  about  the  Desert 
edges,  weathered  into  the  semblance  of  the  tawny  hills, 
will  tell  you  tales  like  these  convincingly.  After  a 
little  sojourn  in  that  land  you  will  believe  them  on  your 
own  account." 

MARY  AUSTIN, 
In  "The  Land  of  Little  Rain." 


Mirages  of  the  Desert, 


MIRAGES  OF  THE  DESERT. 

jWAY  back  in  the  old  days  when  the  slow- 
moving  ox  team  dragged  its  weary  way, 
foot  by  foot,  over  the  alkali  flats  and  the 
long  streatches  of  sun-baked  soil,  where 
the  only  growth  was  the  gray  sage  and 
the  greasewood — away  back  in  those  far 
days— the  mirage,  that  Lorelei  of  the  Desert,  was  there 
to  lure  men  on  to  their  destruction. 

Great  lakes  of  shining  water,  where  little  waves  ran 
up  to  lap  the  shore ;  wide  fields  of  clover  and  blue  grass, 
that  looked  so  green  and  cool  under  the  burning  sun; 
forests  which  reached  miles  away  in  a  tangle  of  vine 
and  tree— those  were  the  visions  that  the  Siren  of  the 
Dry  Lakes  showed  to  the  water-starved  emigrant  of 
old,  and— beckoning— led  him  on  and  on,  in  the  pursuit 
of  the  unreal,  until  the  picture  grew  fainter  and  fainter, 
and  at  last  down  the  diminishing  perspective  of  the 
vision— as  he  looked— he  saw  it  fade  away.  The  grassy 
fields  where  the  oxen  might  have  fed,  the  sparkling 
waters  at  which  they  might  have  drunk,  the  broad- 
leafed  shade  under  which  man  and  beast  might  have 
found  refreshing  rest,  were  gone !  A  tantalizing  glimpse 
of  Paradise  in  the  great  and  awful  desolation  of  those 
Desert  days. 

Many  a  poor  traveler,  led  far  astray  by  following  the 
ever-calling,  ever-retreating  enchantress,  has  laid  down 


Mirages 
of 
the 
Desert* 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Mirages 
of 
the 
Desert, 


at  last  to  die  alone  in  that  vast  waste,  where  his  bones 
must  bleach  in  the  sun,  and  his  dust  must  become  the 
sport  of  the  winds  of  the  Desert. 

I  can  recall  instances  innumerable  of  emigrant  trains 
deceived  by  the  mirage  and  led  far  out  of  their  course, 
in  the  hope  of  reaching  the  lakes  of  water  that  looked 
so  deep  and  pure. 

Down  through  the  valley  of  the  Humboldt,  in  that 
part  of  the  great  American  Sahara  which  the  old  emi 
grant  knew  so  well,  they  traveled— they  whose  faces 
were  set  toward  the  land  of  gold  and  the  setting  sun. 
And  there,  as  they  passed  along  the  banks  of  the  long 
and  tortuous  Humboldt,  they  were  told  a  fable  that  was 
believed  by  many  a  wayfarer  of  the  early  days;— that, 
except  fish  could  be  seen  swimming  about,  the  waters  of 
the  river  were  poisonous  if  one  drank  of  them  deeply. 
So  people  became  afraid  of  it,  and  went  far  out  of  their 
route  to  avoid,  if  possible,  drinking  the  fatal  waters  of 
the  " River  of  Death,"  as  it  came  to  be  called.  Then, 
when  alluring  lakes  and  ponds,  and  lovely  forests  and 
fields  spread  out,  a  picture  of  enchantment  before  their 
gaze,  is  it  any  wonder  that  they  eagerly  hurried  onward 
toward  the  prospect  held  out  so  invitingly  toward 
them? 

Only  those  who  have  suffered  like  disappointment 
can  imagine  the  despair  of  beholding  such  a  vision 
dissolve  into  thin  air  palpitating  in  heat  waves  over 
the  wide  plain— as  far  as  the  eye  could  see,  only  a 
shimmering  haze. 

The  mirage  is,  in  very  truth,  a  part  of  the  Desert 
itself— just  as  the  sagebrush,  and  the  coyote,  and  the 
little  horned  toads,  and  the  sand-storms  are  part.  To 
those  who  know  Desert-land,  the  picture  would  be  in 
complete  without  them. 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Perhaps  the  commonest  form  the  mirage  assumes  is 
that  of  bodies  of  water — from  tiny  ponds  only  a  few 
feet  across,  to  great  lakes  so  broad  that  the  farther  shore 
seems  beyond  the  range  of  vision.  I  have  seen  such 
lakes  under  the  heat  of  mid-day  sun  when  the  quiver 
ing  air  gave  them  the  appearance  of  crested  waves,  so 
like  those  of  reality  that  were  it  not  for  my  acquaint 
ance  with  the  topography  of  the  country,  as  well  as  the 
knowledge  that  I  had  of  the  strange  forms  the  mirage 
takes,  I  should  have  felt  tempted  to  believe  in  their 
tangibility. 

In  a  few  instances  I  have  seen  small  boats  on  the  sur 
face,  the  reflection  of  them  in  the  water  being  in  perfect 
mimicry  of  nature's  mirroring;  and  on  one  occasion,  a 
great  ship  under  full  sail— though  mistily  seen,  and 
seemingly  far— rose  and  fell  with  the  swell  of  the  waves. 

Such  of  these  as  I  myself  have  seen,  have  always 
appeared  near  the  centre  of  some  large  alkali  flat,  where, 
upon  almost  any  hot  spring  or  summer  day,  small 
bodies  of  water  may  be  seen  reflecting  the  heavens  with 
a  deeper  blue  than  the  sky  was  ever  known  to  wear. 
Sometimes,  on  the  far  side  of  these  ponds  you  may  see 

a  wavering  border  of what?  You  look,  and  look 

yet  again ;  and  still  you  cannot  tell  what  strange  things 
they  may  be.  Not  trees;  not  human  beings;  neither 
are  they  creatures  of  the  earth,  nor  of  the  air,  that  are 
moving  on  the  opposite  shore.  It  is  something  unreal, 
the  presence  of  which  you  feel,  but  cannot  explain; 
something  you  watch  with  a  delighted  fascination; 
something  exquisitely  intangible,  like  the  dream  of  a 
dream,  and  as  impossible  to  describe.  It  must  be  seen 
to  be  understood;  no  writer's  pen,  no  painter's  brush 
can  faithfully  portray  it. 

Early  Spring  mornings,  when  the  sun  rising  from 
behind  the  purple  range  of  mountains,  still  cold  and 


Mirages 
of 
the 
Desert, 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Mirages 
of 
the 
Desert, 


dark  on  its  western  slope,  has  filled  the  valley  with 
a  soft,  golden  glow,  and  lighted  the  mountains  across 
the  way  till  they  begin  to  take  on  that  delicate  tint 
which  only  early  morning  gives,  then  far  down  in  the 
valley  where  the  East  Range  rises  up  at  the  left  of 
the  southern  gateway,  the  mirage  runs  riot  with  its 
fantastic  fashioning. 

The  mountains  alter  their  outlines  so  rapidly  that 
the  eye  can  scarce  note  all  their  changes.  They  change 
Tom  great  heights  to  a  low  chain  of  hills;  and  leap 
Dack  again,  to  shoot  in  spires  innumerable  into  the 
violet  sky,  or  drop  into  a  long,  flat  table-land  with 
overhanging  top;  while,  above— in  the  air— here  and 
there  float  elongated  islands  that  but  a  moment  before 
were  a  part  of  the  mountains  beneath— mountains  that 
are  being  pierced  by  gigantic  caverns  through  which 
the  sky  can  be  seen.  Then  they  disappear,  and  island 
and  table-land  once  more  unite ;  and  again  a  myriad  of 
pinnacles  lift  themselves  from  the  mass  of  changing 
panorama,  and  the  slender  shafts  reach  far  into  the  sky. 
Then — even  as  you  are  watching — one  by  one  they  dis 
solve,  and  the  mountains  have  resumed  their  wonted 
shapes. 

Farther  down  the  valley  (for  this  is  a  particular 
valley  I  know,  that  I  am  describing  here,  and  for  more 
than  a  score  of  years  it  was  my  home ;  and  in  my  heart 
I  have  named  it  the  only  Home  I  have— for  we  loved 
each  other,  the  Desert  and  I) — before  the  days  of  track 
and  train — there  was  a  station  built  for  the  accommoda 
tion  of  passing  teamsters.  The  building  had  been  con 
structed  of  time-stained  lumber,  torn  out  of  the  old 
houses  of  deserted  mining  camps  in  the  adjacent  moun 
tains.  The  small,  dull-toned,  unpainted  cabin  stood, 
uncompromising  in  its  plainness,  in  the  midst  of  a  broad, 
staring,  white  alkali  flat,  where  the  owner  of  the  sta- 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


tion  had  previously  assured  himself  of  a  sufficient  water 
supply.  For  the  establishing  of  such  stations  depends 
largely  upon  one's  being  able  to  obtain  an  unfailing— if 
only  fairly  good — supply  of  well  water.  And  the  lo 
cation  of  this  station — here  in  the  very  centre  of  a 
barren,  snow-white  flat — was  the  result  of  his  having 
found  the  only  place  where  water  could  be  g;ot,  by  dig 
ging  for  it,  within  a  distance  of  forty  miles.  Travel  to 
and  from  the  mines  northward  was  increasing,  and  with 
it  came  an  increase  in  the  station-man's  sales;  for  he 
not  only  had  a  "general  merchandise  store" — though 
of  diminutive  proportions — and  conducted  what  he  was 
pleased  to  call  a  "stable,"  but  he  set  forth  food  for  man 
as  well.  With  his  success,  came  the  knowledge  that  it 
had  created  envy  in  the  breast  of  another — one  who 
would  be  a  rival;  for  this  other  declared  his  inten 
tion  of  erecting  at  the  same  point  on  the  road  the  emi 
grants  traveled,  a  like  establishment,  and  thus  compet 
ing  with  him  for  their  custom. 

Much  bitter  feeling  was  expressed,  and  many  hot 
words  passed  between  them.  Finally  the  station  keep 
er  made  a  threat  to  kill  the  other  man  at  sight  should 
he  ever  bring  material  there  for  the  construction  of  a 
rival  house.  Matters  stood  thus  for  some  time,  each 
man  waiting  for  some  decisive  move  on  the  part  of  the 
other.  Then  the  one  who  claimed  prior  right  to  the  lo 
cation,  taking  his  four-horse  team,  went  in  to  Virginia 
City  for  goods  to  replenish  his  stock,  which 
the  fast  increasing  Idaho  travel  was  reducing  to  a  small 
quantity. 

On  his  return  trip,  when  within  a  mile  or  two  of  home, 
he  suddenly  noticed  opposite  his  own  plainly  built 
little  cabin,  a  fine,  large  building  of  new  lumber— the 
brightness  of  the  fresh  pine  boards  putting  to  shame  his 
own  unpretentious  and  almost  shabby-looking  house. 


Mirages 

of 

the 

Desert, 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Mirages 

of 

the 

Desert, 


Enraged  at  the  thought  that  his  rival  had  taken  such 
an  advantage  as  the  week's  absence  had  given  him,  he 
reached  back  into  the  wagon,  and  got  out  his  Henry 
rifle.  With  the  cocked  weapon  laid  across  his  knees— 
revengeful  and  determined— he  waited  impatiently  for 
the  heavily  laden  team  to  draw  near  to  the  spot  where 
he  was  resolved  that  his  threat,  made  weeks  before, 
should  be  put  into  execution. 

There  it  stood !  A  two-story  house  of  unpainted  pine ; 
its  gable  to  the  road,  its  front  door  invitingly  open,  its 
shutterless  windows  looking  toward  tne  South,  as  if 
watching  his  approach. 

He  saw  it  all  as  plainly  as  he  saw  his  own  poor  little 
home  across  the  way;  then— when  within  less  than  a 
hundred  yards  of  it — there  was  a  shivering  of  the  whole 
scene,  and  the  "opposition"  station  disappeared  into 
nothingness,  leaving  but  the  one  building  there— the 
small,  solitary  house  that  for  several  years  thereafter 
stood  without  rival  on  the  alkali  plain. 

With  the  going  of  the  larger  building,  went  also  the 
station-keeper's  desire  for  vengeance;  and  scarcely  a 
traveller  ever  stopped  at  his  place  afterward  who  did 
not  hear  from  him  the  story  of  the  strange  mirage.  The 
name  "Mirage''  clung  to  the  place,  and  finally  it  came 
to  be  so  christened  by  the  railroad  company  whose  lines 
passed  its  door.  A  siding  is  there  for  waiting  freights 
that  you  glimpse  as  you  flash  by  in  a  train  made  up  of 
"Pullmans;"  but  the  railroad  men — when  you  ask 
them — will  call  it  "My-ridge."  Shadow  pictures  waver 
about  the  place  when  the  summer  sun  shines  hot,  but 
the  station  built  of  new  pine  has  never  reappeared. 

Some  localities  seem  specially  adapted  to  the  condi 
tions  whi«h  invite  a  mirage.  I  know  of  a  bush— a  large 
greasewood— out  near  the  middle  of  a  certain  smooth, 
level  flat  that  is  over  two  miles  broad  and  fully  twice 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


as  long,  that  during  the  summer  months  seems  always 
to  be  wrapped  in  the  mystic  mantle  of  a  mirage.  Some 
times  it  has  no  definite  shape,  but  always  the  mirage- 
like  effect  is  there.  A  road  crosses  this  flat  two  hundred 
yards  away,  and  after  I  first  observed  the  bush,  I  took 
pains  to  notice  it  particularly,  scarcely  ever  passing  it 
when  the  days  were  full  of  shimmering  heat  that  it 
did  not  take  on  some  semblance  of  flesh  and  blood.  So 
repeatedly  did  this  seem  to  occur  that  I  came  to  call 
it  "My  Ghost-Bush,"  and  watched  it  with  an  interest 
that  was  generally  rewarded  by  having  some  apparently 
living  form  evolve  itself  from  the  greasewood's  scant 
and  ragged  branches. 

It  is  apt  to  make  the  shivers  run  up  one's  spine  to  see 
a  harmless  looking  bush,  of  a  sudden,  metamorphose 
itself  into  a  tall  man,  and  see  the  man  come  striding 
toward  you  with  a  long,  swinging  step ;  and  then— while 
you  are  still  intently  gazing,  and  wondering  where  he 
could  have  sprung  from  on  that  barren  Desert  bit — as 
suddenly  discover  that  he  is  walking  away  from  you — 
and  backwards,  at  that.  An  uncanny  thing,  you  may 
be  sure ;  yet  one  gets  used  to  it,  after  a  while,  and  to  the 
knowledge  that,  after  all,  it  is  only  one  of  the  many 
Desert  marvels.  And  dozens  of  times  did  I  see  this 
great,  gaunt  man  go  striding  across  the  level,  white 
plain,  and  then  disappear  as  though  touched  by  a  magi 
cian's  wand,  leaving  the  lone  greasewood  standing  there 
instead.  Sometimes  he  seemed  to  be  carrying  a  roll  of 
blankets  on  his  shoulders,  as  some  poor  wayfarers  in 
Desert-land  do ;  and  at  other  times  one  could  have  sworn 
that  he  was  visibly  swinging  a  walking-stick  as  he 
went.  There  were  days  when  the  bush,  instead  of  stand 
ing  there  so  tall  and  thin,  settled  itself  down  into  the 
semblance  of  some  heavier  body;  and  then  one  could 
see  a  sheep  standing  at  the  edge  of  a  little  pond  as  if 


Mirages 

of 

the 

Desert, 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Mirages 
of 
the 
Desert. 


nibbling  at  the  grass  that  seemed  to  grow  there.  At 
times,  it  would  lift  its  head  as  though  it  looked  at  you ; 
then  as  the  shimmering  of  the  heat  waves  increased,  it 
trotted  away  into  the  white  glare  of  the  summer  sun 
light,  and  was  no  more.  Sometimes  there  were  two  ob 
jects  instead  of  one;  but  whether  moving  away  across 
the  flat,  or  standing  still  by  the  little  patch  of  imaginary 
water,  their  movements  were  always  identical  if  the 
mirage  was  of  two. 

Once,  I  remember,  it  seemed  to  be  an  awkward,  half- 
grown  girl  that  moved  there;  and  the  point  of  her  big 
gray  shawl— too  big,  by  far,  for  her  slim  body 
—was  trailing  behind  her  on  the  ground. 

There  have  been  gulls — ten  or  twelve  seagulls — walk 
ing  about  in  the  shallow  imaginary  water,  picking  at 
imaginary  weeds.  And  once  when  there  was  a  large 
flock  of  them,  and  they  began  to  melt  into  the  ether,  I 
found  that  there  were  real  gulls  among  them— three  of 
them— that  had  come  far  inland  from  their  home  by  the 
salt  sea,  going  toward  the  Lake  that  is  Salt. 

But  all  of  these  things  that  were  of  the  mirage-world 
and  without  the  breath  of  life,  whether  slim-built  girl, 
or  the  man  who  was  of  sturdier  mould,  or  the  sheep,  or 
the  seagulls— all  had  the  trick  of  moving  when  I  moved, 
of  standing  still  when  I  stood  still.  Then,  when  I  had 
driven  past  a  certain  point  in  the  road,  they  invariably 
dissolved,  leaving  only  the  heat  glimmering  across 
the  landscape,  and  the  "ghost  bush"  there,  quiet  and 
alone. 

Once,  in  a  rage  at  the  mocking  thing,  I  turned  my 
horses'  heads  toward  it,  determined  to  drive  onto  it, 
over  it,  and  crush  it  down.  It  irritated  me  to  feel  that 
I  could  not  go  by  it  there  on  the  road  without  the  sense 
less  bush  taking  unto  itself  the  likeness  of  some  living, 
breathing  thing.  I  drove  hard  and  straight  at  it,  and 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


although  there  was  not  a  particle  of  wind  stirring  the 
stifling  air,  yet  that  miserable  bush  was  swaying  back 
and  forth  as  if  waving  defiance  at  me.  Whipping  up 
my  team,  I  drove  over  it,  the  "off"  horse  crushing  more 
than  half  its  branches  down  to  the  ground.  A  shiver 
that  ran  over  me,  in  spite  of  the  heat  of  that 
Desert-day,  for  the  thing  had  become  so  real  to  me  as 
a  creature  of  life,  that  I  almost  expected  it  to  shriek  out 
in  pain  as  its  crooked,  misshapen  branches  cracked  and 
snapped  under  the  hoofs  of  the  horses. 

It  has  never  been  my  good  fortune  to  meet  any  of  the 
old-fashioned  ghosts  that  go  up  and  down  the  earth 
with  rattling  bones  and  a  musty  smell— the  kind  that 
leave  a  splotch  of  blood  on  everything  they  touch,  but 
I  doubt  if  they  are  any  more  uncanny  than  a  gray 
wraith  evolved  out  of  a  greasewood  bush  by  the  aid  of 
a  mirage. 

We  do  not  always  recognize  a  mirage  as  such  when 
we  see  one,  or  experience  the  "creepy"  feeling  that  a 
meeting  with  ghosts  is  supposed  to  engender.  Among 
the  memories  I  have  of  things  that  were,  in  the  gray 
country,  is  one  of  driving  along  a  dusty  road  on  a 
hot  August  day,  and  seeing  some  little  distance  ahead 
of  me,  through  a  blur  of  dust  that  seemed  to  rise  from 
the  road,  a  six-horse  wagon  driven  by  a  man  wearing 
a  red  shirt.  The  wagon,  which  looked  to  be  heavily 
loaded  with  sacks  of  grain,  appeared  to  have  been  once 
painted  a  bright  blue,  and  the  running-gear  an  equally 
vivid  red — colors  now  dulled  by  dust  and  time.  A 
cloud  of  fine,  flour-like  alkali  arose  about  the  wheels 
and  around  the  horses'  hoofs. 

With  my  thoughts  elsewhere,  though  with  eyes  upon 
this  not  unusual  sight  upon  the  traveled  roads  of  Desert- 
land,  I  watched  it  for  more  than  a  quarter  of  an  hour, 
as  it  seemed  to  jolt  and  bump  along  its  way.  Although 


Mirages 

of 

the 

Desert, 


10 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Mirages 

of 

the 

Desert, 


was  driving  rapidly  that  I  might  reach  it  and  pass 
it,  and  so  be  beyond  the  dust  that  seemed  to  be  stirred 
up  by  the  wheels,  and  which  would  soon  be  floating 
back  and  covering  me,  yet  I  did  not  seem  to  gain  upon 
it.  Finally  I  noticed  that  it  moved  only  as  I  did.  Then, 
when  horses,  and  wagon,  and  driver,  and  the  dust  from 
the  powdered  white  earth  had  disappeared,  I  realized 
that  it  had  been  but  a  mirage.  Accustomed  as  I  had 
long  been  to  seeing  them  in  all  their  varying  guises,  not 
for  one  instant  had  I  suspected  what  it  really  was.  I 
have  counted  it  among  the  most  remarkable  mirages 

have  ever  known  of,  because  its  coloring  was  so 
bright;  the  apparently  new,  vivid  red  shirt  the  man 
wore  was  a  quite  unusual  bit  of  mirage  color.  For 
these  Desert  wraiths  choose  robes  of  dull  grays, 
or  browns  that  are  dull  and  dim;  unless  it  may 
be  in  the  blue  of  sky  and  the  water,  or  the  green  of  grass 
and  the  trees. 

Then,  I  remember  once  seeing  the  red  dress  of  a 
woman  reflected  in  a  mirage  that  took  the  form  of  a 
small  and  shallow  pond  that  seemed  to  lie  between  that 
part  of  a  "dry  lake"  over  which  a  road  passed,  along 
which  she  was  driving  with  a  companion,  and  another 
point  half  a  mile  away  where  I  was  driving  along 
another— and  parallel— road.  The  bright  color  of 
her  dress,  the  man's  darker  clothing,  the  horses  (one 
black,  the  other  white),  the  wagon,  were  all  reflected 
with  wonderful  exactitude  in  the  simulated  water. 
These  people  I  knew;  and  afterward;  when  speaking 
to  them  about  it,  they  too  said  they  had  seen  the  mirage 
of  the  pond  lying  between  us,  and  had  remarked  upon 
the  vividness  with  which  my  reflection  was  shown 
there.  Although  we  were  such  a  distance  apart,  yet 
each  of  us  could  see  the  movement  of  the  horses'  feet 
reflected  in  the  water.  Unlike  the  former  mirage  I  had 


In  Miners'  Mirage  Land 


seen  where  the  red  had  shown  with  such  brilliancy,  here 
the  color  was  real— only  the  reflection  of  the  woman's 
red  dress  in  the  mirage-lake  being  the  unreality. 

Of  all  the  wonderful  pictures  painted  by  this  artist 
of  the  atmosphere— and  I  have  seen  many— there  was 
never  one  which  in  magnitude,  in  grandeur,  in  beauty 
of  form  and  tinting,  even  remotely  approached  one 
which  I  witnessed  in  the  spring  of  1869. 

It  was  about  two  hours  after  sunrise— the  magic  time 
the  mirage  chooses  for  its  most  ideal  forms — when  I 
happened  to  notice  that  the  portion  of  Eugene  Moun 
tain  known  as  the  Woody  Canon  district  was  under 
going  one  of  those  marvellous  transformations  so  fre 
quent  in  the  rarified  air  and  high  altitude  of  that  sec 
tion.  The  change  from  the  dull  reddish  hue  of  the  rug 
ged  mountain  to  all  of  the  loveliest  tints  that  the  mind 
can  imagine,  was  rapid.  The  early  morning  sun  had 
filled  the  valley  with  a  warm  yellow  light,  and  one 
seemed  to  be  looking  through  a  golden  veil  at  the  gigan 
tic  castle  that  fashioned  itself  from  the  mountain's 
rocky  top.  Turrets,  and  round  towers,  and  battlement- 
ed  walls;  graceful  arches,  and  windows,  narrow  and 
long,  were  all  there— parts  of  a  structure  stupendously 
magnificent  in  its  beautiful  gradations  of  color,  violet, 
purple  and  lightest  rose.  But  even  as  with  subdued 
breath— lest  a  sigh  of  delight  or  a  word  ever  so  softly 
spoken  might  dispel  it — I  watched  its  rare  and  exquisite 
beauty,  it  faded  away,  and  again  the  rough  contour  of 
Eugene  Mountain  loomed  up  where  the  mystical,  mythi 
cal  castle  had  been  but  a  moment  before.  Such  a  gor 
geous  representation  of  magnificent  architecture  in  such 
beautiful  coloring  never  again  was  presented  to  the  de 
lighted  quartette  which  witnessed  that  bewildering 
fantasy  of  Nature. 


Mirages 
of 
the 
Desert* 


12 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Mirages 

of 

the 

Desert, 


To  those  who  know  the  Desert's  heart,  and— through 
years  of  closest  intimacy— have  learned  to  love  it  in  all 
its  moods,  it  has  for  them  something  that  Is  greater  than 
charm,  more  lasting  than  beauty,  yet  to  which  no  man 
can  give  a  name.  Speech  is  not  needed,  for  they  who  are 
elect  to  love  these  things  understand  one  another  with 
out  words;  and  the  Desert  speaks  to  them  through  its 
silence. 

To  others— those  who  need  words  and  want  people  in 
numbers— the  Desert  is  but  a  gray  waste  of  sand  and 
sagebrush,  lying  in  pitiful  loneliness  under  a  gray  sky. 

Utter  desolation!  To-day  is  like  yesterday— to-mor 
row  will  be  like  to-day.  The  sun  rises  each  morning 
upon  a  scene  which  never  alters,  except  when  a  change 
is  wrought  by  the  mirage  in  its  illusive,  elusive  mystery. 


THE  MYTHS  OF  THE  DESERT. 

UT  the  Desert  showed  another  mirage 
than  that!  of  grass-bordered  water- 
stretches,  to  the  men  who  came  a-search 
for  gold  in  the  Days  of  'Forty-Nine;  so 
that— even  to  this  hour— some  are  still 
striving  to  reach  it,  away  out  there  in 
the  sand  wastes. 

The  mines  of  old  called  men  out  of  the  East,  to  seek 
a  fortune  in  the  State  that  borders  the  sunset  sea.  And 
there  they  washed  gold  from  the  creek  and  river-bed 
in  quantities  sufficient,  one  would  think,  to  stay  the 
prospector's  feet  from  wandering  further.  Yet  many 
there  were  who— after  crossing  the  plains— were  lured 
back  to  sagebrush-land  by  the  fabulous  tales  of  gold 
and  silver  there ;  and  so  have  lived  more  than  a  double 
score  of  years  in  the  land  of  the  mirage,  seeking  some 
mirage-mine. 

Rich  ledges  in  plenty  are  there,  but  not  to  the  North 
in  the  lava  country.  Some  knew  where  to  find  them; 
and  the  men  who  mined  them  have  grown  rich  and  gone 
away.  Of  them  I  do  not  speak.  My  tales,  instead,  are 
of  those  fanatical  prospectors  who  are  ever  striving  for 
the  rainbow's  end  in  their  quest  for  rainbow-gold. 

Into  the  gray  Desert  (a  land  of  gray  sage,  and  gray 
sand;  of  lizards,  and  little  horned-toads  that  arc  gray; 
a  land  where  the  coyote  drifts  by  you,  like  a  fragment 


Myths 
of 
the 
Desert* 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Myths 

of 

the 

Desert, 


from  gray  fog-banks  blown  by  the  wind),  half  a  cen 
tury  ago,  they  came— the  prospectors— seeking  silver 
or  gold.  And  some  yet  seek,  in  places  where  there  is 
none.  Some  are  following  the  mirage  still. 

Once— long  ago— my  horse  and  I  went  away  into  the 
mirage-land  of  these  old  miners ;  and  there  I  heard  them 
voice  the  stories  of  their  hopes— the  dreams  that  they 
believe  will  some  day  come  true.  By  camp-fire  smoke, 
or  in  the  dim  light  of  sod  cabins,  I  have  sat  in  the  silence 
the  Desert  teaches,  and  have  listened  as  they  talked, 
and  believed  while  I  listened.  Yes,  even  believed;  as 
you,  too,  will  believe  if  you  hear  from  their  own  lips 
the  fables  that  seem  so  true  during  the  hour  you  are 
under  the  story-teller's  charm,  with  no  sound  break 
ing  in  save  the  crooning  of  the  Desert  wind  or  the  cry 
of  a  lone  coyote.  One  must  sleep  well,  and  dream  of 
other  things,  before  the  coming  of  the  time  that  will 
bring  disbelief. 

They  are  only  miners '  fables ;  but  they  sounded  true. 
And  for  an  evening  and  a  day  I  believed  them.  And 
I  am  glad  I  believed.  If  I  had  not— if  I  had  been  a 
doubter— those  hours  would  have  lacked  just  what 
makes  them  now  among  my  dearest  kept  memories. 
And  if  you,  who  read  these  re-told  tales,  are  of  those 
who  have  heard  the  Voice  of  the  Desert  speaking,  I 
know  you  will  understand. 


THE  SECRET  MINE  OF  THE  BROWN  MEN. 

;IDING  for  weeks  up  and  down  trails  that 
took  me  into  canons  and  over  roads  that 
crossed  the  alkali  levels  of  the  wide,  still 
I  country  tucked  away  under  the  northern 
most  shelter  of  Nevada,  it  was  no  difficult 
mental  process  to  put  myself  back  half  a 
century  in  time's  reckoning  and  feel  that  I  was  one  of 
those  Desert  voyagers  of  long  ago. 

As  they  saw  it,  so  can  we  see  it  today;  so  little  has 
man  disturbed  the  landscape.  Nature 's  visible  processes 
are  slow,  and  few  people  find  their  way  here,  for  man 
kind  to  make  "improvements."  The  broad,  far-reach 
ing  picture  remains,  as  the  still  years  slip  by,  mostly 
unchanged. 

On  the  earth's  well-traveled  roads  you  never  saw 
such  pictures  as  these!  Not  only  are  they  beautiful, 
but  they  are  different— and  all  that  implies!  Look! 
Under  a  summer  sun's  shimmering  light,  distance  paints 
the  far  ranges  faintly  in  all  the  colors  of  the  spectrum, 
while  the  near  mountains  rise  about  you,  gray  and 
grim.  Over  there  is  the  blending  of  the  mountain's 
blue  and  violet  tintings ;  here  a  gray-banded  cone  rises, 
its  western  side  furrowed  and  seamed  like  an  old  fron 
tiersman's  face.  Between,  lie  miles  and  miles  of  drab- 
colored  plain  spotted  with  leper-patches  of  alkali — 
wide  plains  that  reach  from  ridges  of  gaunt,  gray  slate 


The 

Secret 

Mine 

of 

the 

Brown 

Men 


i6 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 

Secret 

Mine 

of 

the 

Brown 

Men 


to  far-away  hyacinthine  hills.  Someone  tells  you  that 
those  distant  ranges  are  red-brown  when  you  reach 
them ;  but  now  they  are  a  lovely,  delicate  mauve,  veiled 
as  they  are  by  the  mists  of  distance. 

And  so,  before  you,  day  by  day,  as  you  go  riding 
away  out  of  noisyland  into  the  big  silence,  you  find 
thousands  of  pictures  to  delig-ht  the  eye  and  charm  the 
senses  into  a  long-continued  joy— such  joy  as  only  the 
Desert  can  give. 

Turn  your  horse's  head  to  the  right,  here!  Ahead 
of  you  are  the  foothills — a  double  row  of  saffron- 
colored  buttes,  each  capped  with  outcroppings  of 
rough  and  craggy  brown-black  rocks.  Ride  over  them, 
and  you  will  see  fissures  where,  down  in  the  cleavage, 
are  clay  cliffs  among  buried  coal  cinders  left  by  the 
great  conflagration.  Higher,  the  mountain  is  striped 
horizontal- wise  in  vivid  coloring;  each  shade  marked 
in  broad,  glaring  bands,  bench  above  bench,  with  the 
vigor  and  boldness  of  a  painter  who  lays  his  colors  on 
with  a  pallette-knife.  Rocks  run  riot  In  their  medley 
of  coloring;  striking— indescribable.  You  lope  your 
horse  along  a  "wash"  leading  down  from  the  higher 
slopes,  thick  strewn  with  brightness  as  a  springtime 
hillside  in  bloom.  It  is  graveled  with  water-worn 
pebbles,  brilliant  and  of  variegated  shades,  with  here 
and  there  big  cobbles  of  the  same.  Not  striped,  not 
mottled,  not  merely  faint  tints  of  coloring,  but  of  a 
uniform  depth  of  rich  purple,  or  blood-red,  green,  or 
yellow,  or  blue— every  stone.  So  bright,  and  so  many ! 
Yet  among  them  all  is  never  a  hint,  so  far  as  you  can 
see,  of  galena,  iron  pyrites,  or  mineral  of  any  sort — 
minerals  of  value  or  valueless  ones  that  might  suggest 
the  proximity  of  others  of  real  worth.  In  all  your  ex 
perience  you  have  never  come  across  a  district  so  bar 
ren  in  its  "indications."  Yet  among  these  van-tinted 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


mountains  many  a  miner  still  is  hunting  for  silver  or 
gold  that  he  heard  of  in  the  long  ago— one  of  the  many  The 
mythical  mines  that  are  believed  in  still. 

Your  eyes  are  never  at  rest,  but  go  seeking  new  de-  Secret 
lights  all  the  while,  as  you  ride  through  the  enchanted  Mine 
silence.    Over  there  are  vaporous  mountains— soft,  vio-  of 
let  visions  of  mystic  regions  far,  far  beyond;  here  is 
all  that  is  grotesque,  freaks  in  color   and   formation.  the 
Such  odd  mountains,  such  fantastic  hills,    they   are!  Brown 
Look  at  those  lying  northwest!    Below,  they  are  low  Men 
and  smooth— round  buttes   of  lemon-yellow,  shading 
into  a  glaring  ochre;  back  of  them,  and  higher,  rise 
beetling  crags  that  lift  crests  in  battlement  and  turret, 
all  ebony  or  burnt  umber.    On  the  one  hand,  perhaps, 
the  hills  are  grimly  gray ;  on  the  other,  they  are  wrapped 
in  wavering  tints  soft  as  the  coloring  on  a  wood-dove's 
breast. 

The  delight  of  it  all,  the  charm,  grows  on  you  as  the 
miles  lengthen  out;  and  you  forget  heat  and  fatigue 
and  the  comforts  you  left  back  where  civilization  waits 
your  return.  You  only  know  that  it  is  good — vastly 
good — to  live !  Just  to  feel  yourself  drawing  the  breath 
of  life  is  enough,  while  taking  your  outing  in  this  far 
away  corner,  where  you  seem  to  have  the  whole  earth 
and  sky  to  yourself.  What  more  would  you?  The  big 
gest,  most  beautiful  of  pictures  make  the  rim  of  the 
world  here,  to  repeat  themselves  in  wavering  mirages 
on  the  levels  that  lie  within  the  circle  of  the  skyline. 

It  is,  in  truth,  a  land  of  mirages ;  but  those  you  see  dis 
solving  into  the  ether,  as  you  draw  close  to  their  fanciful 
outlines,  are  not  the  ones  that  were  the  lures  bringing 
many  a  traveler  into  this  enchanted  land.  Scarcely 
a  day,  riding  through  its  length  and  breadth,  did  I  jour 
ney  there  that  I  did  not  hear  tales  of  fairy- weave  about 
hidden  gold — of  mines  that  men  search  for  year  in  and 


i8 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 

Secret 

Mine 

of 

the 

Brown 

Men 


year  out,  never  finding,  but  always  expecting  to  find 
tomorrow— the  next  day— next  week— or  the  week 
after.  They  are  always  sure  of  standing  on  the  very 
brink  of  discovery.  You  look  about  you,  you  look  at 
them,  and  you  wonder  at  their  faith.  To  the  average 
prospector,  there  is  nothing  suggesting  either  gold  or 
silver  thereabouts;  yet  among  the  old  guard  that 
brought  Nevada  into  prominence  as  a  mining  State,  are 
many  who  have  grown  old  in  the  service  they  have  given 
a  useless  quest.  Scarcely  a  canon  of  these  rainbow- 
ranges  alternated  with  others  of  Desert-gray,  that  does 
not  have  its  story  of  a  "lost  mine."  Dozens  of  such 
have  I  listened  to  in  that  country.  At  nightfall  when 
we  would  sit  outside  the  cabin  door,  an  old  man, 
between  puffs  on  his  pipe,  would  tell  a  tale  he  fondly 
believed ;  or  on  some  rainy  day  before  a  huge  sagebrush 
fire,  have  I  hearkened  as  the  story-teller  poked  at  the 
coals  with  a  poker  made  from  a  miner's  "spoon" ;  or  up 
on  the  heights,  while  I  sat  in  the  saddle  and  leaned  down 
to  some  old  prospector  who  declared  his  certainty  that 
those  very  mountain  heights  held  the  long  unfounded 
mine— his  very  own.  Mirage-mines  are  they;  yet  the 
men  who  tell  the  myths,  alas!  believe  them  true. 

One  night,  as  the  stars  came  out,  after  we  had  eaten 
by  the  campfire's  warmth,  at  a  camp  made  on  the  edge 
of  one  of  the  "dry  lakes"  in  which  the  Desert  abounds, 
looking  into  the  glow  of  the  greasewood  coals,  I  heard 
this  tale  from  one  of  its  believers: 

Years  and  years  ago,  over  the  California  State-line, 
Job  Taylor  kept  a  trading  post  in  Indian  Valley,  He 
was  one  of  the  earliest  pioneers ;  and  after  establishing 
the  post — much  frequented  by  Indians  who  sometimes 
paid  for  their  purchases  in  gold  dust — he  was  greatly 
astonished  one  day  at  having  payment  tendered  him,  by 
one  of  the  Indians,  in  nuggets  of  extraordinary  size. 


In  Miners'   Mirage-Land 


These,  he  declared  (when  relating  the  Incident  after 
ward),  were  as  large  as  hen's  eggs.  The  questions  he 
put  to  the  Indian  as  to  the  locality  where  they  were  pro 
cured,  brought  forth  no  answer.  No  satisfactory  re 
plies  whatever  were  obtained  from  the  brown  man,  who 
hastened  to  get  away. 

The  following  year  the  same  Indian  came  again  to 
the  trading  post;  and  again  he  offered  nuggets  of  un 
usual  size  in  payment  for  his  purchases.  Again  Taylor 
importuned  him  to  tell  where  they  were  found;  but  he 
met  with  no  satisfaction.  It  was  not  until  a  year  later 
that  Taylor  succeeded  in  making  a  sufficiently  good  im 
pression  on  the  Indian  to  encourage  his  confidence. 
Then  he  said  that,  for  a  certain  amount  of  goods  from 
the  post,  he  would  tell  Taylor  all  he  knew  of  the  place; 
and  for  a  further  consideration  he  would  take  him 
there.  The  agreement  being  satisfactorily  made,  Capt. 
Wetherell— an  old  Indian  fighter  of  experience— was 
induced  to  join  them.  Well  equipped  for  such  an  un 
dertaking,  the  three  started  out,  setting  their  faces  to 
the  east,  to  find  the  place  that  the  Indian  described  as 
containing  so  great  a  number  of  mammoth  nuggets. 
It  was  a  creek,  he  said— a  fine  stream  filled  with  moun 
tain  trout,  and  sheltered  in  part  by  many  trees. 

From  Indian  Valley  they  went  to  Susanville,  and 
then— keeping  on  the  Honey  Lake  road— camped  one 
night  by  the  springs  at  Deep  Hole.  It  was  while  they 
were  there  that  the  Indian  said  to  them:  ''Two  more 
sleeps,  and  we  get  there!  I  know." 

Just  at  that  time— the  precise  year  I  have  forgotten- 
old  Winnemucca,  chief  of  the  Paiutes  (he  for  whom  the 
town  of  Winnemucca  was  named),  was  camped  on  Gran 
ite  Creek  Mountain ;  and  to  him  the  Indian  bore  a  mes 
sage  from  some  of  his  people,  across  the  line  in  Cali 
fornia.  It  was  while  they  were  at  Deep  Hole  that  the 


The 

Secret 

Mine 

of 

the 

Brown 

Men 


20 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


The 

Secret 

Mine 

of 

the 

Brown 

Men 


Indian  said:  "I  got  go  see  ol'  Winnemuc',  an'  tell  um 
what  them  Injun  say.  You  wait  here.  I  come  back 
pretty  quick." 

On  the  following  day  he  returned  to  them,  downcast, 
and  the  bearer  of  disheartening  news.  He  had  told  the 
old  chief,  he  said,  of  their  expedition,  and  Winnemucca 
had  become  very  angry— he  was  "heap  mad,"  he  said. 
Further,  the  chief  declared  he  would  have  him  killed  if 
he  took  these  men  farther  on  their  quest;  for— he  had 
argued  to  the  younger  man— if  white  men  found  gold 
there,  they  would  come  in  numbers  so  great  as  to 
frighten  away  much  of  the  game— the  deer,  the  ante 
lope,  and  the  mountain  sheep — on  which  the  Indians 
principally  relied  for  subsistence.  The  Indian  would 
be  the  sufferer  if  the  white  man  came ;  in  no  wise  would 
he  gain  by  their  coming.  Hence,  the  search  must  be 
abandoned. 

Entreaties  —  threats  —  promises  —  bribes !  they  all 
availed  nothing.  The  old  man's  edict  was  irrevocable, 
so  it  would  be  useless  for  the  white  men  to  go  to  him 
(as  they  discussed  doing)  for  favor.  The  Indian  him 
self  would  do  nothing  more.  That,  under  the  changed 
conditions,  he  would  forfeit  all  the  goods  at  the  trad 
ing  post  that  he  had  bargained  for,  seemed,  to  him,  a 
matter  of  utter  indifference. 

So  the  two  men  made  their  way  back  to  California; 
and  neither  Captain  Wetherell  nor  Job  Taylor  ever  saw 
the  Indian  again.  Whether  it  was  that  the  old  chief  had 
given  him  orders  to  shun  the  White  Man  lest  the  secret 
be  wrested  from  him,  or  whether  he  had  no  more 
gold  to  offer  in  exchange  for  clothing  and  food,  no  one 
could  say.  Only  of  this  were  they  sure;  never  again 
did  he  come  to  the  post. 

However,  the  following  year,  a  young  Indian— a  mere 
boy— came  with  nuggets  similar  to  those  that  had  been 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


previously  offered  to  Taylor.    The  boy  had  no  hesita 
tion  in  talking  about  them  and  said,  in  reply  to  his  ques-  The 
tioners,  that  some  of  the  old  men  of  the  tribe  had  gath 
ered  the  gold,  but  that  he,  himself,  had  never  seen  the      cret 


place  from  whence  it  was  obtained.  They  had  told  him, 
he  said,  that  he  was  yet  too  young  to  be  shown  the  way 
to  the  canon,  though  he  had  been  taken  by  them  to 
other  canons  near  by.  But  he  declared  that  though  he 
had  never  seen  the  exact  place,  he  had  attentively  lis-  Brown 
tened  to  the  talk  of  his  elders  each  time  they  returned  Men 
with  treasure,  when  the  whole  camp  had  gathered  about 
in  council  as  to  the  best  method  of  disposing  of  it ;  and 
from  their  description  of  the  canon,  and  his  own  knowl 
edge  of  adjacent  localities,  he  was  sure  he  could  find 
the  nuggets'  hiding  place. 

The  white  man  made  tempting  inducements  for  the 
boy  to  guide  him  to  the  spot;  but  he  was  reluctant  to 
do  so.  He  repeated  the  declaration  of  the  old  men  of 
the  tribe  that  he  was  "too  young,"  and  that  they  would 
"get  heap  mad"  should  he  take  white  men  there.  But, 
finally,  he  admitted  that  he  knew  an  old  man  who  was 
in  disfavor  with  the  rest  of  the  tribe,  who  had  gathered 
some  of  the  gold,  and  might  be  induced  to  act  as 
their  guide.  "I  take  you  go  see  him,"  said  the  boy; 
"then  maybe  he  show  you  place.  Him  live  by  Deep 
Hole." 

Taylor,  Wetherell  and  the  boy  set  out;  and  over  the 
same  road  they  had  traveled  when  the  older  Indian 
was  guide.  At  Deep  Hole,  too,  they  found  the  old  In 
dian  whom  the  boy  declared  they  would  find.  They  saw 
him,  but  that  was  all.  There  was  more  to  be  desired 
than  the  mere  sight  of  the  old  gray-haired  Indian,! 
whom  they  believed  to  have  taken  nuggets  from  the; 


Mine 

of 

the 


22 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


The 

Secret 

Mine 

of 

the 

Brown 

Men 


unknown  canon.  Alien  he  might  be  from  the  rest  of 
the  tribe,  yet  he  was  loyal  to  their  interests.  The  eager 
prospectors  found  him  absolutely  dumb  when  informa 
tion  was  desired.  He  would  give  them  no  intelligent 
answers  whatever.  To  all  questioning  they  got  but 
the  stereotyped  reply  of  the  Indian  who  does  not  want 
to  talk:  "Me  no  savvy.  Me  no  know."  Nor  could 
they  get  more  than  that  from  him  through  the  two 
days  they  lingered  there  for  that  purpose.  Every  ar 
tifice  to  induce  him  to  disclose  his  secret,  failed.  He 
had  evidently  been  impressed  by  the  warning  of  Chief 
Winnemucca;  and  tribal  traditions  constrained  him  to 
silence.  And  when  an  Indian  elects  to  keep  closed  lips, 
the  Sphinx  is  not  more  dumb. 

Then  the  two  men  got  the  boy  to  one  side,  and  stern 
ly  demanded  some  knowledge  of  the  gold's  locality. 
The  little  fellow  was  frightened  at  the  threatening  man 
ner  Capt.  Wetherell  assumed,  and — half-crying—prom 
ised  to  take  them  there  if  he  could.  He  was  far  from 
sure  of  the  precise  canon  it  might  be,  but  he  knew 
of  the  locality,  and  had  a  general  knowledge  of  the 
mountain  itself.  He  would  make  an  effort— he  would 
try— maybe  he  could  take  them  there;  the  things  the 
old  Indians  had  told  in  his  presence,  when  returning 
to  their  camps  with  the  great  nuggets  of  gold,  were  not 
forgotten,  and  these  memories  would  be  his  guide?. 

"Come  on.  I  think  may  be  so  I  fin'  it,"  he  said;  and 
the  journey  was  resumed. 

Both  men  noticed  that  their  route  continued  in 
the  same  direction  indicated  by  the  other  Indian  as 
being  "two  sleeps"  further  on.  At  the  end  of  the  first 
of  these  two  days  of  travel,  while  lying  In  their  blan 
kets  at  night,  supposing  the  boy  asleep,  Capt.  Weth- 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Mine 

of 

the 

Brown 

Men 


erell  said  to  Job  Taylor:    "If  that  Injun  fails  to  show 
us  the  place,  I'll  make  short  work  of  him!"    It  is  to  The 
be  doubted  if  the  captain  meant  more  than  to  express 
his  emphatic  annoyance  at  the  way  their  progress  was     ' 
being  discouraged  by  guides  who  deserted,  and  guides 
who  would  give  no  information  as  to  things  one  wanted 
to  know.    But  certainly  the  threat  must  have  sounded 
ominous  enough  to  one  small  guide  to  warrant  his  de 
sertion.     For  the  captain's  indiscretion  cost  him  and 
Taylor  dear.    Morning  came;  but  the  boy  was  gone. 

Gone,  as  a  whirlwind  that  dissolves  itself  in  the 
Desert!  And  the  place,  so  far  as  they  knew,  nor  the 
men,  ever  knew  him  more.  He  had  overheard  the 
threat ;  and  fearing,  no  doubt,  that  he  might  not  suc 
ceed  in  the  search,  and  in  terror  of  possible  results,  at 
day-dawn  he  had  put  miles  and  miles  between  him  and 
the  rough-spoken  white  man  who  had  planted  terror 
in  his  young  heart. 

Frequent  search  was  made  afterward  for  the  lost 
Indian  diggings,  but  they  keep  their  secret  still.  There 
is  a  canon  a  mile  and  a  half  east  of  Ebling's,  in  Virgin 
Valley,  in  northeastern  Humboldt  county,  that  men 
declare  to  be  the  one  the  Indians  worked  in  days  of 
old.  It  is  also  believed  by  many  to  be  the  one  where 
the  famous  "Blue  Bucket"  gold  was  found.  The  tale 
goes  that  these  two  lost  placers  are  the  same— the 
"Blue  Bucket"  mines,  and  those  which  the  Indian  has 
always  kept  hidden  from  the  White  Man. 

Though  it  is  now  impassable  for  wagons,  yet  the  old 
er  Indians  living  there,  say  that,  years  and  years  ago, 
when  the  first  white  men  came  into  the  country  on  their 
way  to  the  West,  many  of  them  passed  down  the  nar 
row  and  deep  gorge  above  Ebling's,  which  though  al- 


24 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 

Secret 

Mine 

of 

the 

Brown 

Men 


ways  difficult,  is  now  impossible  to  travel  of  any  sort- 
even  passage  on  foot  may  be  won  only  at  great  risk  of 
life  or  limb.  No  faintest  trace  of  wagon  road,  nor  even 
the  slightest  mark  of  trail  is  there.  During  the  last 
forty  years  great  masses  of  rock  have  been  continually 
falling,  and  have  choked  the  way.  The  few  of  recent 
years  who  have  undertaken  it  afoot,  have  stories  of  un 
counted  hardships  to  tell. 

It  may  be  (if  you  choose  to  believe  it  so),  that  this 
is  truly  the  canon  of  the  Indians'  secret  diggings.  It 
may  be  that  this  is  really  the  canon  of  the  lost  "Blue 
Bucket"  gold.  It  may  be  that  these  were,  after  all, 
but  mirage  mines;  but  whatever  the  truth,  the  search 
goes  on— goes  on. 


THE  CHARM  OF  THE  DESERT. 


likely  such  a  tale  seems  absurd  to 
you,  as  you  read  it  between  the  covers  of 
a  book,  the  while  surrounded  by  the 
things  that  make  a  busy,  people-full 
world.  But  do  not  give  voice  to  that  dis 
belief.  Not  even  to  yourself  must  you  con 
fess  your  own  incredulity,  lest  it  may  prove  a  thorn  in 
the  flesh  if  you  should  go  into  Desert  ways  some  day. 
For  there  may  come  to  you  some  time  a  twilight  hour 
that  shall  find  you  in  greasewood-land,  and  a  guest  at 
the  campfire  of  some  one  of  those  old  prospectors  whose 
guest  I,  too,  have  been.  Then  he  himself,  you  may  be 
sure,  will  tell  you  this  story.  He  will  tell  it  to  you  in  al 
most  the  very  words  I  have  used;  but  it  will  have  a 
quality  which  my  own  story-telling  has  not—  that  of 
carrying  conviction  to  your  heart. 

For  you  will  believe.  Ay  !  you  will  believe  it  is  true  ; 
you  will  believe  that  there  is  a  marvel  of  gold  there 
for  the  lucky  one  who  is  to  find  it. 

There,  at  the  end  of  day,  by  the  drifting  blue  smoke 
from  the  sagebrush  campfire—  where  he  has  boiled  the 
coffee  that  you  will  declare  the  best  that  was  ever 
brewed—  with  the  Desert's  weirdness  creeping  up  to 
you  with  the  dusk,  while  you  eat  of  the  strips  of  bacon 
your  host  has  cooked  and  the  bread  he  has  baked 
in  the  ashes,  you  will  gladly  and  greedily  listen  to  the 


The 

Charm 

of 

the 

Desert* 


26 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 
Charm 
of 
the 

Desert, 


story  again.  And  then — when  you  hear  him  tell  it  in 
the  way  that  he  told  it  to  me — you  will  believe  it  true. 
The  charm  of  the  Desert  will  be  all  about  you ;  the  mys 
tery  of  the  Desert  will  move  you  in  ways  that  you  have 
never  known.  Strange  thoughts  will  be  yours,  of  things 
that— in  that  strange  land— in  your  heart,  you  feel 
might  very  well  be.  And  of  the  truth  of  what  you  may 
hear,  you  will  not  question. 

There  are  those  who  have  asked  me:  "What  is  the 
charm  of  the  Desert?  What  is  there  in  the  Desert  that 
makes  you  care  for  it  so?  What  constitutes  its  hold 
on  those  who  have  love  for  its  solitude?" 

I  would  answer  the  last  question  first.  Its  hold  upon 
its  lovers  is  the  very  love  they  give.  For  to  love  is  to 
hold  out  one's  wrists  for  the  shackles  to  be  snapped 
thereon.  It  does  not  matter  to  what  or  to  whom  love 
is  given,  it  is  so — always.  So  I  have  answered  you  this 
question.  But,  the  others — Its  charm?  And  why  does 
one  care? 

How  can  one  convey  meaning  to  another  in  a  lan 
guage  which  that  other  does  not  understand?  I  can 
only  tell  you  the  charm  of  the  Desert,  when  you,  too, 
have  learned  to  love  it.  And  then  there  will  be  no  need 
for  me  to  speak. 

But  this  much  I  may  say  that  you  will  understand: 
In  the  Desert  all  things  seem  possible.  If  you  ask  me, 
again,  "Why?"  then  I  cannot  tell  you;  only  I  know 
it  is  so. 

Perhaps  that  accounts  for  the  faith  of  the  old  pros 
pectors. 


THE  QUEST  OP  OLD  MAN  BERRY. 

HE  faith  of  the  old  prospectors !   There  is 
no  other  such  blind  faith  in  the  world. 

Take  up  your  map  of  the  Western 
States.  There,  where  the  great  Oregon 
lava  flow  laps  over  the  State  line 
of  Nevada,  in  the  northwestern  corner, 
lies  the  Black  Rock  country.  Out  there  in  that  sweep 
of  gray  sand  and  sage-levels,  and  grim  heights— the 
scaling  of  which— taxes  the  soul  sorely,  I  found  him— 
the  typical  prospector,  "Old  Man  Berry,"  or  "Uncle 
Berry, ' '  they  called  him.  Over  eighty  years  old  he  was, 
and  for  more  than  fifty  years  of  his  life  led  by  the  lure 
of  a  mirage. 

All  day  I  had  been  traveling  over  alkali  flats  and 
greasewood-covered  mesas,  to  reach— in  late  afternoon 
—the  upper  tablelands.  They  were  dotted  with  moun 
tain  mahogany,  and  slashed  with  canons  where  streams 
ran  bordered  with  cottonwood  and  aspen. 

It  was  already  dusk  when  we  began  our  descent  of 
one  of  the  larger  canons,  and  quite  dark  when  we 
stopped  at  the  ranch-house  doorway,  through  which  the 
lamplight  streamed— the  friendliest  sight  a  Desert  way 
farer  ever  "meets  up  with." 

We  had  come  upon  one  of  those  small  ranches  that 
are  tucked  away  in  the  heights,  where  old  pros 
pectors  are  as  sure  to  drift  to,  when  not  out  in  the 


The 

Quest 

of 

Old 

Man 

Berry 


28 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


The 

Quest 

of 

Old 

Man 

Berry 


mountains  with  poll-pick  and  hammer,  as  though  they 
— like  the  ranchman's  collie  or  the  cat  curled  up  on 
the  bunk— were  among  the  assets  of  the  place. 

He  was  tall  and  spare— gaunt,  you  would  have  called 
him ;  and  you  would  have  noticed  at  once  how  bowed  he 
was.  But  not  as  other  old  men  on  whom  age  has  rested 
a  heavy  hand.  It  was  the  head,  not  the  back,  that  was 
bowed — as  though  he  had  walked  long  years,  and 
far,  with  his  eyes  upon  the  ground.  When  he  lifted 
them  quickly — looking  directly  into  your  own — you 
found  they  were  bright  and  piercing,  with  a  keenness 
that  belonged  to  a  man  forty  years  his  junior;  and  you 
felt  that  his  sight  reached  away  beyond— to  things  not 
of  your  reckoning. 

We  speak  of  beards  that  are  "snow- white/'  and 
and  usually  it  is  a  misapplied  term.  His  was  really 
white  as  snow— white  as  freshly  fallen  snow  is  white, 
with  thick  and  long  hair  to  match.  A  patriarch  of  the 
mountains,  he;  you  would  have  declared. 

Except  as  you  noted  his  trembling  hands,  and  saw 
how  heavily  he  leaned  his  weight  against  the  staff  he 
carried  as  he  walked,  you  did  not  feel  he  was  old— 
rather  it  was  as  though,  of  his  own  choice,  he  wrapped 
himself  in  a  dignity  of  years— wearing  it  as  a  monarch 
wears  his  robes  of  state,  in  no  wise  to  be  counted  as 
the  mark  of  flying  Time. 

Indeed,  there  was  something  royal  about  the  old 
man;  and  you  might  join  the  others  (the  ranch  hands, 
and  the  teamsters,  and  the  cowboy  crew)  in  good- 
humored  scoffing  at  the  old  man  himself,  as  well  as  his 
hobbies,  when  his  back  was  turned.  Yet,  not  you,  nor 
any  man  among  them  dared  to  jest  ever  so  lightly  to 
his  face.  He  commanded  your  respect.  And  you,  too, 
would  have  shown  him  the  same  deference  as  they  did, 
whenever  he  spoke.  Somehow,  one  feels  more  or  less 


In  Miners'   Mirage-Land 


a  coward  to  try  to  disabuse  a  man  of  his  faith  in  a  thing 
that  he  has  believed  in  with  all  his  soul  for  a  lifetime. 
So  it  is  the  kinder  way,  even  as  it  is  the  easier  way, 
to  listen  as  they  tell  of  such  things  as  you,  perhaps,  may 
doubt. 

That  night,  after  the  supper  dishes  had  been  cleared 
away,  and  the  others  had  gone  out  to  sit  in  the  dark 
ness,  and  smoke,  and  talk  over  the  day's  work  and  the 
plans  for  the  morrow,  while  the  crickets  sang  their 
night-song  to  the  stars,  Old  Man  Berry  and  I  sat  by 
the  bare  pine  table,  by  the  wind-blown  flame  of  a  flar 
ing  kerosene  lamp,  while  he  told  me  of  his  quest  for  a 
mine  he  had  been  seeking  for  more  than  half  a  hun 
dred  years. 

Back  in  the  days  of  the  young  century  when  he  had 
crossed  the  plains,  while  camping  at  the  point  of 
Black  Rock,  he  had  found  a  bit  of  "float."  Small,  it 
was,  but  so  rich  in  gold  that  it  scarcely  seemed  real. 
It  was  lying  at  the  edge  of  the  well-traveled  road  where 
it  almost  touches  the  foothills.  He  looked  about  every 
where  for  others  of  the  same  sort.  That  one  wonder 
ful  nugget  was  all  that  he  found. 

The  old  man  unfastened  his  shirt-front,  and  drew 
from  his  breast  a  buckskin  bag— a  crudely  constructed 
affair  that  bespoke  his  own  handiwork.  It  hung  sus 
pended  from  his  neck  by  a  buckskin  string.  Old  Man 
Berry  handled  it  as  though  it  were  something  holy, 
turning  it  over  and  over,  as  though  weighing  it. 
Finally  he  untied  the  string,  and  turned  the  bag  up 
side  down.  The  nugget  struck  heavily  on  the  boards 
of  the  table.  It  was  a  wonder!  Enough,  and  more 
than  enough  to  drive  any  man  mad  with  the  gold  fever. 

"Nuggets  like  these  don't  just  happen  anywhere— 
as  if  they  were  made  in  the  sky,  and  let  fall,"  he  said. 
"They  come  from  a  ledge— carried  down  to  the  flats 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 

Quest 

of 

Old 

Man 

Berry 


by  the  forces  of  Nature.  They  are  like  strangers  down 
there— their  home  is  in  the  mountains.  This  came 
from  the  mountains— the  mountain  back  of  Black 
Rock.  There  is  a  ledge  there  somewhere.  Where 
in  what  canon  or  on  what  ridge?  Maybe  it  is  a  long, 
long  way  from  there;  for  'float'  travels  a  long  way 
sometimes.  Where  is  it— where?  Where  will  I  find 
it,  and  when?  But  I  will  find  it!  I'll  find  it,  so  help 
me  God!  Why,  I  have  almost  found  it  now— almost, 
but  not  quite.  For  I've  found  a  place  that  tallies  with 
the  Frenchman's  story,  and  what  the  Padre  told.  I 
may  find  it  next  week;  and  it  will  be  MINE!  There 
are  tons  and  tons  of  gold  like  this,  where  this  came 
from." 

He  was  talking  fast  and  feverishly,  and  I  saw  he  was 
no  longer  talking  to  me,  but  rather  thinking  aloud.  He 
had  forgotten  me— his  surroundings— everything,  ex 
cept  the  one  thing  he  never  forgot,  sleeping  or  waking. 

For  a  long  time  he  sat  there,  turning  his  fetish  over 
and  over  in  his  knotty  and  weathered  hands.  I  hardly 
breathed  as  I  watched  him— never  moving,  my  eyes  on 
the  nugget,  too.  Somehow  I  had  caught  sight  of  the 
face  of  the  Siren,  and  was  one  with  him,  for  the  time. 

Suddenly  he  seemed  to  remember  me,  and  he  hastily 
put  the  nugget  back  in  the  little  bag,  and  slipped  it 
again  into  his  breast.  I  could  hear  the  men  lazily  talk 
ing  where  they  leaned  back  against  the  walls  of  the  sod 
house ;  and  an  owl  hooted  over  at  the  barn.  The  chirp 
ing  of  the  crickets  sounded  shriller  than  ever  from  their 
cover  in  the  tall  weeds  and  nettles  down  by  the  creek.  I 
heard  it  all  as  in  a  dream.  There  was  something  unreal 
in  all  the  sounds.  Nothing  seemed  real  and  believable, 
except  the  sight  of  the  nugget  of  virgin  gold,  and  the 
tale  of  Old  Man  Berry. 

By  and  by,  I  heard  him  talking  again— telling  me 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


how,  at  that  time,  he  had  ventured  to  stay  in  the  coun 
try  for  a  few  days,  to  prospect  in  the  hope  of  finding 
the  ledge.  Not  for  long,  however ;  for  he  dare  not  risk 
the  savages,  or  draw  too  heavily  on  his  food  supply 
which  was  barely  enough  to  see  him  through  to  Cali 
fornia.  The  delay  brought  him  no  reward.  He  found 
no  ledge ;  neither  did  he  find  any  sign  of  mineral  in  all 
the  district.  He  was  forced  to  abandon,  for  the  time 
being  at  least,  his  quest,  and  to  push  on  to  the  sea. 
Once  there,  however,  he  was  impatient  to  get  back; 
and  again  he  returned  to  the  sagebrush  country.  Once 
more  his  quest  brought  him  nothing,  and  he  was  forced 
to  return  to  the  coast.  So  he  went  back  and  forth  be 
tween  the  sea  and  the  sagebrush;  and  finally  he  came 
to  stay.  Now  he  had  been  here  for  so  long,  that  he 
could  not  count  the  years.  And,  anyway,  what  did  it 
matter?  Few,  or  many,  it  was  all  the  same  to  him. 

"There  are  others— reliable  people,  I'd  have  you 
know— who  know  that  there  is  gold  here,"  he  said. 
Then  he  went  on  to  tell  me  the  Padre's  story: 

Away  back  in  the  years  that  were  gone,  a  California 
miner,  while  journeying  through  Mexico,  took  the  op 
portunity  offered  him  by  a  Mexican  friend,  to  examine 
some  of  the  old  Spanish  archives  preserved  there.  The 
friend  had  noted  in  what  he  had  read,  that  gold  had 
been  discovered  in  a  locality  that— as  he  rightly 
thought— would  be  crossed  by  the  old  emigrant  road. 
Knowing  this  friend  from  the  North  was  well  ac 
quainted  with  the  country,  he  called  his  attention  to  it. 

There— recorded  by  a  Padre  long  dead— was  an  elab 
orate  account  of  a  wonderful  find  of  gold,  made  by  the 
Padre  himself  when  he  was  a  Desert-voyager  through 
a  country  hundreds  of  miles  to  the  North,  in  what  was 
then  Spanish  possessions.  The  record  gave  latitude  and 
longitude  of  the  place,  and  noted  many  important 


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landmarks,  to  guide  the  ones  whom  the  Padre  was  to 
lead  there  when  he  could  organize  an  expedition.  But 
the  Padre  had  fallen  ill— was  sick  unto  death,  and  had 
died.  Yet  not  before  he  had  made  a  map  of  the  coun 
try,  and  which  was  on  record  with  the  description  of 
his  journey's  discovery. 

With  these  to  assist  him  in  his  search,  the  miner 
started  on  his  northward  way  into  the  country  of  the 
great  plains.  The  Padre's  description  of  certain  boiling 
springs  which  this  miner  found,  and  camped  at  for  a 
number  of  days,  tallies  precisely  with  that  given  by 
Fremont  in  his  journal.  The  latter  says: 

"The  basin  of  the  largest  one  has  a  circumference 
of  several  hundred  feet;  but  there  is  at  one  extremity 
a  circular  space  of  about  fifteen  feet  in  diameter  en 
tirely  occupied  by  boiling  water.  It  boils  up  at  irregu 
lar  intervals,  and  with  much  noise.  The  water  is  clear, 
and  the  spring  is  deep.  A  pole  about  sixteen  feet  long 
was  easily  immersed  in  the  centre;  but  we  had  no 
means  of  forming  a  good  idea  of  its  depth.  It  was  sur 
rounded  on  the  margin  with  a  border  of  green  grass," 
(the  date  of  this  entry  was  January)  "and  near  the 
shore  the  temperature  of  the  water  was  206  degrees. 
We  had  no  means  of  ascertaining  that  of  the  centre, 
where  the  heat  was  greatest;  but,  by  dispersing  the 
water  with  a  pole,  the  temperature  of  the  margin  was 
increased  to  208  degrees,  and  in  the  centre  it  was  doubt 
less  higher.  By  driving  the  pole  towards  the  bottom, 
the  water  was  made  to  boil  up  with  increased  force 
and  noise.  There  are  several  other  interesting  places, 
where  water  and  smoke  and  gas  escape,  but  they  would 
require  a  long  description.  The  water  is  impregnated 
with  common  salt,  but  not  so  much  as  to  render  it  un 
fit  for  general  cooking;  and  a  mixture  of  snow  made 
it  pleasant  to  drink." 


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Now  the  miner  found  the  boiling  springs  that  the 
Padre  found,  and  that  Fremont  tells  of.  The  latitude 
and  longitude,  as  given  by  Fremont  in  his  journal,  is 
precisely  that  given  by  the  Padre.  Then  the  record 
of  the  Padre's  travels  tells  how  he  went  still  farther 
north,  and  to  what  is  now  the  Oregon  State  line,  or 
very  nearly  so  far.  The  miner  and  the  companion 
on  the  trip  followed  as  their  compass  led,  while 
they  neared  the  place  where  the  holy  father  had  seen 
the  fabulous  gold  ledge,  along  the  Honey  Lake  Val 
ley  road,  as  far  as  Buffalo  Springs  in  Northern  Nevada. 
There,  their  course  took  them  away  from  the  traveled 
road,  and  they  struck  out  across  an  unknown  country, 
going  N.— N-E.  To  Pueblo  Mountain  it  led  them— not 
so  far  north  as  the  road  that  goes  through  High  Rock 
canon,  though  up  to  the  mountain's  very  edge. 

But  of  ledge  they  found  no  sign.  Yet  when  leaving 
there,  the  morning  they  were  paqking  up  their  camp 
outfit,  they  found  two  small  nuggets,  which  proved 
that  there  was  gold  there ;  and  these  nuggets  were  simi 
lar  in  appearance  to  the  large  one  Old  Man  Berry  had 
found. 

How  did  they  come  there?  "Uncle  Berry"  declared 
that  they  had  been  carried  away  from  Black  Rock  moun 
tain  by  some  prospector,  who  had  lost  them  from  his 
pack  while  journeying  farther  north.  Though  why  he 
should  say  that,  I  don't  know;  for  he  believes  that  there 
is  a  continuous  ledge,  over  a  hundred  miles  long,  reach 
ing  from  some  point  near  Double  Hot  Springs,  away 
to  Pueblo  Mountain— the  Giant  Ledge  of  the  World! 

So,  though  the  nugget  he  had  found  and  those  found 
by  the  miner  lay  that  distance  apart,  yet  Old  Man 
Berry  declares  they  could  only  come  from  one  and  the 
same  ledge. 

Then  he  reminded  me  that  Pueblo  Mountain  was 


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but  a  short  distance  from  the  place  where  Stoddard 
had  found  nuggets  in  the  " Three  Little  Lakes  of  Gold," 
nor  was  it  far  from  where  the  emigrants  found  the  gold 
that  came  from  the  "Blue  Bucket  Mines";  so  that  it 
is  easy  to  account  for  all  the  scattered  bits  of  gold 
found  through  the  length  and  breadth  of  that  barren 
land.  A  mammoth  ledge  is  there— miles  upon  miles 
wide,  and  hundreds  of  miles  long— but  only  in  one  or 
two  places  does  it  show  itself  in  croppings;  and  only 
by  the  few  nuggets  that  men  have  found,  has  it  ever 
made  itself  known. 

Then  the  old  man  commenced  telling  of  another 
proof  (he  calls  it)  of  his  theory.  Years  ago,  a  French 
man  who  was  traveling  eastward  through  Surprise 
Valley,  found  a  cave  that  was  studded  with  gold.  It 
lies  about  forty  miles  distant  from  the  California  State 
line.  The  Frenchman  had  gone  in  to  seek  shelter 
from  a  storm.  The  day  was  cold,  and  it  was  snowing 
bitterly,  so  that  he  built  a  fire  of  the  roots  and  stumps 
of  sagebrush  that  he  brought  in  from  outside.  As  the 
fire  blazed  up,  and  the  light  flooded  the  cavern,  he 
saw  scattered  over  the  floor  great  nuggets  of  gold  that 
shone  in  the  fire-glow.  The  floor  sloped  away  up  to 
the  rear,  where  the  cave  narrowed  to  a  mere  slit  in 
the  rock,  and  so  barred  a  man  from  going  farther. 
Taking  up  a  firebrand,  he  thrust  his  arm  in  there  as 
far  as  he  could  stretch  it ;  it  lit  up  the  farther  recesses, 
and  he  beheld  there— far  beyond  his  reach— innumer 
able  nuggets  of  the  shining  yellow  metal.  It  seemed 
unbelievable ! 

From  the  floor  of  that  portion  where  he  stood,  he 
gathered  all  there  were ;  and  these  he  tied  up  in  a  cot 
ton  flour-sack,  and  fastened  behind  his  saddle  when 
he  went  away.  The  jogging  motion  of  the  horse,  wore 
a  hole  in  the  sack,  and  many  of  these  (in  fact,  most  of 


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them)  he  lost  upon  the  way.  When  he  missed  them 
he  retraced  his  steps  as  nearly  as  he  could,  but  the 
drifting  snow  had  covered  up  his  horse's  footprints 
and  he  found  none  of  those  he  had  dropped.  Some 
however,  remained  in  a  corner  of  the  sack  that  was 
tied  with  the  buckskin  strings  of  his  saddle.  These,  he 
took  with  him  to  his  home  in  Sacramento,  where  he 
lived  with  a  couple  named  Butler.  He  was  exhausted 
from  the  long  trip,  and  ill  from  exposure.  He  became 
desperately  ill.  Until  he  died,  he  was  nursed  by  But 
ler  and  his  wife,  to  whom  he  gave  the  nuggets.  And 
to  them  he  gave  a  detailed  description  of  the  locality 
in  which  he  found  the  wonder-cave  of  the  Desert.  He 
described  the  formation  of  the  cave  as  being  of  water- 
worn  pebbles  and  fine  crumbled  rock,  embedded  in  a 
formation  similar  to  concrete.  All  through  that  dis 
trict  he  had  found  great  cliffs  and  many  caves — caves 
of  all  sorts.  Just  about  there,  he  found  a  number  that 
were  in  form  like  unto  this  one — as  of  water- worn  rock 
that  was  burrowed  full  of  holes.  But  in  none  of  them, 
except  this  particular  one,  did  he  find  gold.  Here,  they 
were  either  lying  loose  on  the  floor  of  the  cave,  or  em 
bedded  in  the  soft  rock,  from  which  he  dug  many  of 
them  with  his  penknife— aiding  the  work  by  breaking 
away  the  rock  with  a  loose  stone. 

He  gave  the  Butlers  a  rough  chart  he  made  of  the 
country.  To  the  south,  it  showed  the  boiling  springs 
that  Fremont  and  the  Padre  found;  and  the  dotted 
line  he  drew  took  one  on  the  way  to  Pueblo  Moun 
tain.  The  Butlers  went  there,  after  their  friend  had 
died;  and  they  spent  many  a  month  in  a  useless  quest. 
But  it  did  not  lessen  their  belief  that  the  cave  of  the 
wonder-gold  is  there— somewhere.  They  have  the  nug 
gets  still,  and  will  show  them  to  you  as  proof. 

A  dozen  other  instances  did  Old  Man  Berry  tell  me, 


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as  we  sat  there  in  the  little  sod  house,  and  the  men  gos- 
sipped  and  smoked  outside.  But  by  and  by  they  came 
in,  and  then  the  old  man  would  say  no  more.  Perhaps 
he  knew  they  were  skeptics,  and  so  would  not  invite 
derision. 

The  next  morning,  after  I  had  gone  down  to  the 
cabin  from  where  I  had  slept  the  sleep  of  those  who 
are  elect  to  find  rest  under  the  arching,  star-studded 
sky,  I  found  myself  the  last  one  at  the  breakfast  table. 
So  that,  when  I  had  finished,  and  had  gone  outside 
again,  I  found  the  others  gathered  about  the  corral 
where  they  were  assisting  "Uncle  Berry"  get  his 
horses  hitched  to  what  passed  for  a  wagon.  Such  a 
marvel  of  inadequacy  I  never  have  seen,  as  the  "team" 
he  was  to  use  in  getting  off  into  the  Desert  where  the 
lure  of  the  gold— a  veritable  mirage— was  calling  him ! 

Originally  intended  for  a  small  delivery  wagon,  it 
had  long  borne  no  likeness  to  any  sort  of  a  vehicle 
whatever.  There  was  no  dashboard.  There  was  no 
seat.  The  double-trees  were  home-made ;  and  the  tongue 
was  a  cottonwood  pole.  Missing  spokes  in  the 
wheels  were  replaced  by  the  limbs  of  the  quaking  asp ; 
and  the  reach  itself  was  pieced  with  a  pole  used  as  a 
splice.  The  tires  were  wired  on  with  baling  wire- 
wound  round  and  round  with  the  wire,  till  the  tire  it 
self  was  scarcely  to  be  seen.  Wire  all  over  the  wagon ; 
wire  to  mend  the  harness.  The  reins  were  of  bits  of  old 
straps  fastened  together;  and  wouldn't  have  held  a 
runaway  pair  of  kittens.  He  had  a  dry  willow  switch 
for  a  whip.  One  of  the  horses  was  too  old  to  have 
been  properly  apportioned  to  anything  in  this  world, 
except  to  the  filling  of  a  grave  in  a  horse-graveyard. 
The  other  was  a  half -broken  colt. 

Again,  he  was  starting  off  for  Black  Rock.  Alone, 
of  course;  for  he  would  have  none  with  him  on  a  trip 


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like  this,  lest  they  see  where  he  went,  and  so— perhaps 
—some  time  wrest  the  Mine  of  the  World  from  him. 
No ;  there  were  none  he  would  trust.  Did  not  a  nephew 
come  out  of  the  East  to  pave  the  way  to  becoming  his 
heir,  against  the  hour  the  old  man  should  discover  the 

ledge  and then  die.  And  did  not  this  same  nephew, 

who  began  by  calling  him  "Dear  Uncle  Berry,"  end 
by  cursing  him  for  an  "old  fool,"  and  then  go  away 
leaving  the  old  man  laid  up  with  a  crushed  ankle — 
Did  he  not,  all  the  while,  and  secretly,  try  to  find  the 
ledge  for  himself?  No;  he  would  have  none  of  them. 
He  was  sufficient  unto  himself.  He  needed  no  one. 

The  colt  was  acting  badly,  and  two  of  the  cowboys 
were  getting  him  into  the  harness— lightly  dodging 
his  heels  which  he  lashed  out  viciously  at  them,  or 
springing  quickly  aside  as  he  reared  and  came  down 
"spiking"  at  them  with  his  fore-legs. 

After  a  good  deal  of  manoeuvering,  they  got  him 
blindfolded,  and  finally  into  the  harness.  One  of  the 
men  held  the  colt  by  the  head,  while  old  "Uncle 
Berry"  climbed  up  and  seated  himself  on  his  roll  of 
blankets,  which— in  lieu  of  any  other— served  as  a  seat. 

There  was  a  look  of  determination  on  his  face  that 
did  me  good  to  see.  It  was  the  grim  look  that  a  face 
takes  on  when  its  owner  has  the  knowledge  that  he  has 
met  a  worthy  foe,  yet  he  has  willed  to  fight  to  the  end. 
It  stirred  my  blood  with  admiration  to  see  him. 

There  he  was— more  than  eighty-four  years  of  age, 
and  yet  able  to  climb  cliffs,  and  peck  away  at  the  rock 
that  lies  at  the  tops  of  the  mountains.  Why !  they  told 
me,  he  would  ride  this  unbroken  colt— and  did,  often— 
if  the  men  would  help  him  to  mount. 

Such  goods  as  he  got  for  his  small  needs,  must  come 
from  towns  a  hundred  miles  distant;  and  to  them 
(through  the  winter's  snow-drifts,  or  under  the  Desert's 


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dizzying  sun) —alone— in  that  old  rattletrap  of  a 
wagon,  would  he  go.  Truly,  the  old  man  was  the  per 
sonification  of  "Western  pluck." 

He  was  thinly  clad,  and  through  the  threadbare  cot 
ton  shirt  he  wore,  one  could  see  the  framework  of  the 
great,  gaunt  body.  Somehow,  the  other  men  standing 
about  (cowboys,  and  ranch  hands,  and  teamsters), 
seemed  puny  beside  him,— feeble  though  he  was,  and 
an  octogenarian. 

He  nodded  "good  by"  to  us.  Then— "Ready!"  and 
a  pause.  "Let  them  go!"  he  said;  and  the  man  at  the 
young  horse's  head,  pulled  off  the  blind  and  jumped 
back.  The  colt  reared  on  his  haunches— pawed  the  air 
with  his  hoofs,  and  leaped  forward—almost  jerking 
the  old  buckskin  horse  off  his  feet,  as  he  went.  Old 
Man  Berry  sat  there— his  feet  braced  far  apart;  his 
gray  hair  blowing  back  in  the  rush  of  wind  that  came 
up  the  canon;  his  knotted  hands  gripping  the  reins; 
and  that  grim  look  on  his  face  that  made  you  feel  that 
he,  after  all,  was  master  of  whatever  he  undertook. 

So,  down  the  steep  canon,  through  a  cloud  of  alkali 
dust  he  went.  And  every  instant  I  expected  to  see  the 
old  wagon  go  to  pieces. 

"God!  but  he's  got  pluck!"  said  one  of  the  cowboys, 
turning  away  as  "Uncle  Berry"  went  out  of  sight  round 
a  bend.  "They  ain't  nary  thing  that  old  feller  won't 
tackle,  just  give  him  the  chanst.  He's  clean  grit, 
through  and  through!" 

He  was  grit. 

Two  days  later,  when  we  came  down  to  the  ranch 
after  a  day  of  deer-hunting  on  the  heights,  there — at 
the  haystack,  contentedly  feeding — stood  Old  Man 
Berry's  horses.  They  were  necked  together  just  as  he 
had  left  them  when  he  had  turned  them  out  at  night, 
to  graze  on  the  scant  growth  of  artemisia  down  on  the 


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Desert,  and  they— led  by  the  instinct  that  guides  home- 
lovers—had  come  straightaway  to  their  mountain  home, 

The  horses  were  well  and  safe,  but Where  was  Old 

Man  Berry? 

There  was  not  one  of  us  who  did  not  feel  (though 
no  one  dared  voice  that  fear)  that  down  on  the  alkali 
flats  somewhere— far  from  water— they  would  find 
Something  that  would  be  a  horror  to  see. 

The  ranchman  ordered  work  in  the  corrals  stopped, 
and  hurried  the  men  on  swift  errands  he  directed.  To 
the  creek,  to  fill  canteens  and  demijohns  with  water; 
to  the  house  for  blankets ;  to  the  barn  for  horses  to  be 
put  to  the  wagon,  and  others  to  be  saddled.  Every 
man  was  to  aid  in  the  work  of  rescue.  Scarcely  one 
of  them  spoke,  but  all  wore  sobered  faces.  Not  one 
among  them  but  that  loved  the  old  man;  "loco"  though 
they  declared  him  to  be. 

I  watched  them  go  down  the  canon,  as  I  had  watched 
him  go  such  a  short  time  before.  Then  I  went  back  to 
the  sod-house,  and  wondered  where  they  would  find 
him,  and  how.  Ah !  that  is  the  thought— when  we  know 
some  one  is  astray  in  the  Desert— that  grips  one's 
throat,  making  it  hard  for  them  to  swallow.  It  is  as 
though  one's  mouth  was  parched,  and  without  moist 
ure;  and  as  though  one  had  been  long  without  water 
to  drink.  Strange,  is  it  not?  that  our  fears  for  another 
should  in  that  way  hold  the  prophecy  of  what  is  to  come 
to  them. 

After  an  hour  or  two  of  restless  wandering  about  the 
place,  I,  too,  went  down  the  road  that  led  to  the  Desert. 
I  wanted  to  sight,  if  I  could,  the  coming  of  the  men. 
Then— less  than  a  hundred  yards  down  the  canon— 
I  came  upon  them.  They  were  bringing  Old  Man  Berry. 

Alive.     And  quite  determined  to  go  back,  just  as 


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soon  as  he  could  arrange  with  some  one  for  another 
wagon,  Pluck  to  the  last! 

When  he  found  his  horses  had  gone,  he  started  back 
on  foot  after  them,  thinking  to  find  them  but  a  short 
distance  away.  Following  their  tracks,  for  twenty- 
five  miles  he  went  up  and  down  gullies— weary  and 
faint  for  want  of  food ;  over  sun-baked  alkali  flats  where 
the  warped  mud-crust  had  dried  in  up-curled  flakes 
like  feathers  blown  forward  on  the  back  of  some  wind- 
buffeted  fowl—  (it  showed  where  water  had  been) ; 
along  foothills  where  he  stumbled  and  fell,  while  the 
sharp  stones  cut  into  and  bruised  his  flesh ;  through  the 
burning  sand  where  the  sun  seethed  and  bubbled  in 
his  brain,  and  he  wondered  if  he  was  going  mad. 

It  was  the  old  story  of  the  earth  in  those  places  where 
it  is  far  between  water-holes.  He  fought  with  Death 
in  the  Desert.  Fought,  and  won! 

The  cowboys,  after  the  fashion  of  their  kind,  cursed 
him  roundly  (but  with  a  ring  of  tender  feeling  for  the 
old  man  in  every  word  they  said),  and  they  called  him 
many  kinds  of  an  old  fool  for  getting  lost.  All  of  which 
he  took  in  the  spirit  in  which  it  was  meant.  Yet  more 
than  one  of  them  had  wet  eyes  as  he  tried  to  talk  to 
them  with  thickened  tongue  that  was  still  black  be 
tween  his  lips;  and  we  saw  that  his  palms — which  he 
tried  to  hide  from  us — were  all  bruised  and  blood 
stained  from  sharp  stones  where  he  had  fallen. 

He  was  pluck  itself— yes,  sheer  grit;  for  he  fought 
his  way  through  to  victory  over  age,  and  infirmities, 
and  Death.  Yet,  the  end  is  not  yet.  Some  day — there 
on  the  sun-bleached  levels— they  will  find  him— Old 
Man  Berry— when  the  Desert  has  taken  its  toll. 


THE  LOVERS  OF  THE  DESERT. 

(OR  all  the  toll  the  Desert  takes  of  a  man 
it  gives  its  compensation  in  deep  breaths, 
deep  sleep,  and  the  communion  of  stars. 
It  comes  upon  one  with  new  force  in  the 
pauses  of  the  night  that  the  Chaldeans 
were  a  Desert-bred  people.  It  is  hard  to 
escape  the  sense  of  mastery  as  the  stars  move  in  the 
wide,  clear  heavens  to  risings  and  settings  unobscured. 
They  look  large,  and  near,  and  palpitant;  as  if  they 
moved  on  some  stately  service  not  needful  to  declare. 
Wheeling  to  their  stations  in  the  sky,  they  make  the 
poor  world-fret  of  no  account.  Of  no  account  you  who 
lie  out  there  watching,  nor  the  lean  coyote  that  stands 
off  in  the  scrub  from  you  and  howls  and  howls. ' ' 

And  she  who  wrote  the  words  knows.  She  speaks 
from  the  heart  that  understands,  because  it  voices  the 
language  of  love  for  the  vast,  gray,  silent  mystery  that 
means  so  little  to  those  who  flit  by  in  a  day  and  night 
of  car  travel,  and  then  talk  about  "how  lovely"  the 
Desert  is,  and  how  "it  appeals"  to  them.  And  to  those 
I  would  say  that  the  real  Desert,  and  all  its  grave  mean 
ing,  is  farther  away  from  them  than  it  is  from  those 
who  say  nothing  except  that  they  do  not  know  the 
Desert,  and  do  not  care  anything  about  it.  The  Desert 
does  not  need  such  lovers.  Its  voice  will  never  speak 


The 
Lovers 
of 
the 

Desert 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 

Lovers 

of 

the 

Desert* 


Yet 

there  are  many  such— good  folk,  too ;  but  they  are  those 
who  use,  for  the  decorations  of  their  "cosy  corners," 
Indian  baskets  and  Indian  blankets  that  they  buy  at 
the  stores — and  most  of  them  made  by  white  men  or 
women.  The  Indian — his  work  and  wares — have  been 
the  fashion  for  a  little  day  among  those  who  set  the 
styles  for  the  ornamentation  or  disfigurement  of  our 
homes;  but  I  fear  me  his  devotees  (those  who  are  de 
voted  to  him  in  this  special  way)  are  feeling  that  he 
is  getting  to  be  just  a  little  bit— just  a  trifle  passee. 
And  they  are  already  beginning  to  look  about  for  an- 
other  to  take  his  place.  There  is  just  the  shadow  of  a 
sign  that  they  will  choose  the  Desert.  Suppose  it  should 
be?  We  who  reverence  and  love  the  gray  land,  can 
only  hope,  with  a  hope  that  is  half  a  prayer,  that  they 

will  pass  it  by.  Yet If  this  thing  should  happen! 

What  could  we  do — the  Desert  and  I— to  prevent  it? 
The  Desert  and  its  lovers  are  helpless  against  vandals. 

If  you  love  the  Desert,  and  live  in  it,  and  lie  awake 
at  night  under  its  low-hanging  stars,  you  know  you 
are  a  part  of  the  pulse-beat  of  the  universe,  and  you 
feel  the  swing  of  the  spheres  through  space,  and  you 
hear  through  the  silence  the  voice  of  God  speaking. 

Then  you  will  come  to  know  that  no  better  thing  is 
in  the  world  for  man  than  just  this— the  close-touching 
of  great  things ;  the  un-desire  of  the  small,  such  as  the 
man-crowded  places  give  you;  and  just  enough  food 
and  clothing  and  shelter  to  support  life,  and  enough 
work  to  fill  one's  days. 

Now,  all  this  belongs  to  the  old  men  of  the  Desert— 
the  prospectors  who  have  made  the  Desert  their  own. 

So  you  do  not  know,  neither  do  I  dare  say,  how  much 
of  the  joy  of  life  these  old  prospectors  find  in  follow 
ing  the  mirage  of  a  mine  that  leads  them  away  to  life's 


In  Miners9  Mirage  Land 


43 


end  with  empty  palms,  till  at  last  they  lie  down  in  the 
alkali  wastes  to  be  one  with  the  great  silence  of  the 
plains.  If  it  gives  them  much  of  joy  to  deny  themselves 
all  that  you  would  deem  vital,  as  they  live  out 
the  measure  of  their  days,  dare  you  give  them  of  your 
unasked  pity?  Perhaps  they  know  more  of  the  joy 
of  life  than  you,  in  all  the  devious  ways  your  quest  for 
happiness  has  led  you,  have  ever  found. 

Sometime,  your  destiny  may  lead  you  there;  and 
lying  in  your  blankets  some  night  under  a  purple-black 
sky  that  is  crowded  with  palpitating  stars,  while  the 
warm  Desert-wind  blows  softly  over  you — caressing 
your  face  and  smoothing  your  hair  as  no  human  hands 
ever  could — and  bringing  with  it  the  hushed  night- 
sounds  that  only  the  Desert  knows;  then— all  alone 
there  with  only  God  and  the  Desert— you  will  come  at, 
last  to  understand  the  old  prospector  and  his  ways. 
But  not  now;  not  till  you  and  the  Desert  are  lovers. 


The 

Lovers 

of 

the 

Desert* 


Forman* 
Find 


FORMAN 'S  FIND. 

PEN  Fremont's  journal;  turn  to  the  en 
try  he  made  on  New  Year's  day,  1844, 
and  here  is  what  you  will  read : 

"We  continued  down  the  valley  be 
tween  a  dry-looking,  black  ridge  on  the 
left,  and  a  more  snowy  and  high  one  on 
the  right.  Our  road  was  bad  along  the  bottom  by  being 
broken  by  gullies  and  impeded  by  sage,  and  sandy  on 
the  hills,  where  there  is  not  a  blade  of  grass ;  nor  does 
any  appear  on  the  mountains.  The  soil  in  many  places 
consists  of  a  fine,  powdery  sand  covered  with  saline 
afflorescence,  and  the  general  character  of  the  country 
is  desert.  During  the  day  we  directed  our  course 
toward  a  black  cape  at  the  foot  of  which  a  column  of 
smoke  indicated  hot  springs." 

And  so  it  was,  that  the  great  Pathfinder— journey 
ing  west  through  the  unknown,  eerie  land,  vast  and 
Band-strewn—on  that  first  day  of  a  year  now  more  than 
half  a  century  dead,  came  to  know  that  certain  part 
of  Nevada  where  rises  a  great,  gaunt  promontory,  its 
bold  front  to  the  Desert,  grand  in  its  gruesome  barren 
ness,  that  afterward  came  to  be  such  a  well-known 
landmark.  Seemingly  devoid  of  every  vestige  of  ani 
mal  or  plant  life,  it  stands  there  defiant  of  any  soften 
ing  touch  of  nature.  Down  where  steam  clouds  from 
the  hot  springs  show  white  like  sea  spume,  the  moun- 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


45 


tain's  base  is  lapped  by  little  hills  that  make  creamy 
ripples  against  the  other's  black  ruggedness. 

On  the  following  day  after  the  entry  just  quoted, 
Fremont's  journal  bore  these  words:  "At  noon  .  . 
.  .  we  reached  the  hot  springs  of  which  we  had  seen 
the  vapor  the  day  before.  There  was  a  large  field  of 
the  salt  grass  here,  usual  to  such  places.  The  country 
otherwise  is  a  perfect  barren,  without  a  blade  of 

grass We  passed  around  the  rocky 

cape,  a  jagged  broken  point,  bare  and  torn.  The  rocks 
are  volcanic,  and  the  hills  here  have  a  burned  appear 
ance—cinders  and  coal  occasionally  appearing  as  in  a 
blacksmith's  forge.  We  crossed  the  large  dry  bed  of 
a  muddy  lake  in  a  south-easterly  direction  and  en 
camped  for  the  night,  without  water  and  without  grass, 
among  sage  bushes  covered  with  snow.  The  heavy 
road  made  several  mules  give  out  today;  and  a  horse 
— which  had  made  the  journey  from  the  States  suc 
cessfully — was  left  on  the  trail." 

On  the  sixth  day  of  January  Fremont  tells  of  as 
cending  a  mountain  "in  the  south-west  corner  of  a  basin 
communicating  with  that  in  which  we  encamped,  and 
saw  a  lofty  column  of  smoke  ten  miles  distant,  indicat 
ing  the  presence  of  hot  springs." 

In  describing  them,  further  on  he  says:  "This  is 
the  most  extraordinary  locality  of  hot  springs  we  have 
met  during  the  journey." 

After  the  Pathfinder,  came  others ;  and  the  way  grew 
worn  with  many  hoofs  and  wheels  that  moved  west 
ward.  As  the  road  became  traveled,  the  places  gained 
names;  the  "black  cape"  became  Black  Rock,  and  the 
twin  hot  springs  at  its  point  were  known  as  Double 
Hot  Springs,  while  the  great  cauldron  of  hot  water 
across  the  valley  bore  the  name  of  Granite  Creek  Hot 
Springs.  Fremont  gives  the  location  of  these  latter 


Forman's 
Find 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


Forman's 
Find 


as  being  in  latitude  forty  degrees,  thirty-nine  minutes, 
forty-six  seconds.  His  second  day's  camp  from  Black 
Rock  was  made  in  latitude  forty  degrees,  forty-eight 
minutes,  fifteen  seconds.  But  one  must  remember  that 
on  January  second  and  third  his  journeys  were,  each 
of  them,  short,  as  one  day  they  traveled  but  eight  miles, 
and  on  the  other  did  not  start  out  till  afternoon — he 
having  waited  for  the  fog  to  lift. 

These  are  the  things  we  know.  So  much  for  Truth. 
Now  to  the  Legend— if  Legend  it  be. 

If  you  go  out  these  days  into  the  Black  Rock  coun 
try,  you  will  find  dozens  of  camp-fire  story-tellers  who 
will  relate  it  to  you  just  as  they  did  to  me ;  and  no  one 
will  vary  in  the  telling— not  in  the  slightest  detail— 
from  the  way  scores  of  others  tell  it. 

One  night,  of  the  year  eighteen  hundred  and  fifty- 
two,  an  emigrant  party  crossing  the  plains  camped  at 
the  foot  of  the  mountain  due  west  of,  and  in  the  next 
range  from  the  one  since  known  as  Hardin  Mountain. 
Being  out  of  fresh  meat,  two  or  three  of  the  men  were 
chosen,  as  was  the  custom  among  emigrant  parties, 
to  go  out  afoot  and  hunt  along  the  higher  parts  of  the 
mountain  for  game.  One  of  these  men  was  named  John 
Forman. 

The  following  morning,  Forman  and  two  of  his  com 
panions  started  out  early  after  antelope,  deer,  moun 
tain  sheep,  or  such  smaller  game  as  they  could  find- 
going  up  the  mountain  at  whose  base  they  had  made 
their  camp,  which  was  just  across  the  valley  from  the 
point  of  Black  Rock.  Game  being  scarce  on  that  side 
of  the  ridge,  they  ascended  to  the  mountain  top,  intend 
ing  to  cross  over  to  the  farther  side.  On  reaching  the 
summit,  where  they  could  look  down  on  the  plain  be 
yond,  they  saw  what  they  thought  to  be  smoke  from 
Indian-made  fires.  Such  were  generally  the  signal  fires 


IB  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


47 


of  the  hostiles,  so  the  white  men  kept  well  away  from 
points  where  their  movements  would  attract  attention. 
But  they  did  not  cease  their  search  for  game,  while 
bearing  up  from  the  foothills,  and  working  their  way 
along  on  the  side  of  the  mountain. 

Porman  had  dropped  behind  the  others,  and  was  con 
siderably  higher  on  the  slope,  when  he  stepped  on 
some  metallic  substance  that  at  once  attracted  his  at 
tention.  It  was  entirely  unlike  anything  else  he  had 
seen  in  that  volcanic  district— especially  so  in  the  top 
of  this  mountain  of  ashes  and  cinders,  gray  pumice  and 
black  lava.  It  protruded  from  the  ground  in  a  slab 
five  or  six  feet  in  length,  and  was  twelve  or  fourteen 
inches  wide,  at  the  lower  end  it  stood  at  least  sixteen 
inches  out  of  the  ground.  Its  surface  was  as  though 
at  some  remote  time  it  had  passed  through  some  extra 
ordinary  heat— as  if  it  had  been  melted  in  the  fires  of 
a  great  furnace. 

Forman  hallooed  to  the  others,  who  came  back  and 
examined  it  with  him.  It  was  not  at  all  like  any  metal 
lic  stuff  such  as  any  of  the  three  had  ever  seen.  No 
one  could  guess  what  it  might  be ;  though  Forman  him 
self  was  half  inclined  to  declare  it  melted  silver.  With 
their  hunting  knives  they  cut  off  bits  of  the  metal  which 
they  carried  away  with  them  in  their  pockets  as  they 
continued  their  quest  for  game;  for,  though  it  might 
mean  a  fortune  for  each  of  them,  meat  was  of  more  im 
mediate  importance  to  them  all  than  a  mountain  range 
of  solid  silver,  or  even  gold.  So  the  hunters  went  on, 
climbing  the  mountain  and  clambering  over  the  rocks; 
then,  as  the  afternoon  wore  away,  getting  a  better  sight 
across  the  valley,  they  discovered  that  what  they  sup 
posed  to  be  Indian  signal  fires,  was  but  the  rising  vapor 
from  distant  hot  springs;  springs  that  Forman— long 
afterward— came  to  know  as  Granite  Creek  Hot 


Forman's 
Find 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


Forman's 
Find 


Springs.  They  found  no  game  on  the  barren  heights, 
so  went  down  to  the  valley  again,  and  joined  the  rest 
of  their  party  that  night  at  Mud  Meadows  where  camp 
had  been  made. 

Some  days  after,  during  idle  hours  in  camp,  find 
ing  that  the  metal  would  melt  when  subjected  to  ex 
treme  heat,  Forman  took  the  bits  he  had  cut  from  the 
great  metal  slabs  found  on  the  mountain,  and  molded 
them  into  bullets.  What  the  metal  was,  he  had  not  yet 
determined;  but  other  members  of  the  party  had  fully 
convinced  him  that— whatever  it  might  be— it  certain 
ly  was  not  silver. 

Going  down  Pit  river,  in  an  encounter  with  hostile 
Indians,  Forman  found  use  for  the  bullets.  He  shot 
them  all  away. 

In  the  varied  excitement  and  interests  incident  to 
life  in  a  strange  and  newly-settled  country,  he  soon 
—in  California— completely  forgot  the  matter,  until 
it  was  recalled  to  him  later  when  he  was  shown  some 
specimens  of  pure  lead.  Satisfying  himself  that  it 
was  identical  with  the  mineral  he  had  discovered  five 
or  six  years  before,  he  saw  the  gleam  of  fortune  bright 
ening  those  far  off  plains  for  him.  His  decision  was 
formed  at  once.  He  would  forsake  the  gold-seeking 
that  had,  thus  far,  but  ill  repaid  him ;  he  would  return 
to  the  mountains  where  he  had  every  reason  to  believe 
were  tons  of  lead  to  be  had  with  but  little  expenditure 
of  labor  or  money. 

He  confided  in  no  one.  If  it  should  prove,  when  he 
investigated  it,  to  be  after  all  some  worthless  metal 
(which  he  did  not  for  one  moment  believe),  there  would 
be  none  but  himself  the  loser,  or  to  laugh  at  the  mis 
placed  faith.  On  the  other  hand,  if  a  fortune  was  there 
awaiting  the  finder,  then  it  would  be  all  his  own. 

During  the  months  that  intervened  before  he  could 


In  Miners'   Mirage-Land 


49 


arrange  his  trip,  he  became  acquainted  with  a  Mis« 
sourian,  who  told  him  of  a  supposed  lead  mine  away 
back  on  the  desert,  that  was  seen  by  one  of  Fremont's 
party  in  1844.  The  discoverer  had  never  thought  it 
worth  his  while  to  return  to  it  (he  was  too  little  im 
pressed  with  it  to  know  its  real  value) ;  but  he  told  the 
Missourian  the  latitude  of  the  place  they  had  encamped 
the  night  before  ascending  the  mountain  where  he  saw 
a  huge,  protruding  slab  of  the  metal.  He  also  drew 
a  rough  map  of  the  surrounding  country.  It  was  in 
latitude  forty  degrees,  forty-eight  minutes,  fifteen  sec 
onds,  he  said;  and  across  the  valley  rose  a  column  of 
steam  from  immense  hot  springs,  that  looked — as  one 
gazed  down  on  it  from  the  crest  of  the  mountain,  like 
the  signal  fire  of  hostile  Indians.  Forman  listened  with 
keen  interest,  thinking  of  his  own  discovery,  and 
which  he  believed  to  be  the  same.  The  Missourian  ad 
ded  that  he  intended  going  there  in  the  following 
spring. 

Forman  kept  his  knowledge  of  the  great  lead 
mine  to  himself;  but  after  hearing  the  Missourian  ^s  tale, 
his  anxiety  to  go  back  to  the  Desert  increased.  He  has 
tened  his  preparations,  and  early  in  1859  he  was  back 
at  the  spot  where  he  and  his  companions  had  encamped 
seven  years  before.  He  was  back  at  the  foot  of  the 
mountain  that  lies  westerly  from  Hardin  mountain,  and 
in  the  very  next  range.  Everything  seemed  familiar 
—he  recognized  every  well  remembered  landmark.  He 
was  sure  of  success. 

By  the  roadside,  when  arranging  his  own  camp  for 
the  night,  he  noted  that  some  one  had  camped  there 
but  a  short  time  before— perhaps  the  previous  day— 
as  ashes  and  footprints  showed.  Early  morning  found 
him  clambering  over  the  mountain,  stumbling  over 
lava  rock,  or  floundering  through  cinder  and  ash,  as 


Forman's 
Find 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


Forman's 
Find 


he  directed  his  course  to  the  farther  side.  At  last  he 
gained  the  summit,  all  out  of  breath  and  eager,  and 
looked  down  again  upon  the  "Indian  signal  fire"  ris 
ing  across  the  plain.  But  he  saw  something  more- 
something  he  was  unprepared  for.  He  was  not  alone. 

Just  below  him,  where  he  knew  the  treasure  lay,  was 
the  Missourian,  going  back  and  forth,  up  and  down, 
over  the  ground  as  though  seeking  that  which  he  was 
not  able  to  find.  Presently  he  looked  up  and  saw  For- 
man.  Forman  went  down  to  him,  and  the  result  was 
the  inevitable. 

Each  man  accused  the  other  of  trespass,  and  hinted 
at  treachery.  Each  of  the  men — friends  before — eyed 
the  other  with  suspicion.  Then,  covertly,  they  began 
looking  for  the  slab  of  metal,  each  feeling  himself  handi 
capped  in  the  search  by  the  presence  of  the  other,  with 
whom  he  determined  there  should  be  no  division  of 
the  treasure.  So  Forman  and  the  Missourian  alike  car 
ried  on  the  search  surreptitiously— or  tried  to— but, 
with  another  striving  for  the  same  possession,  the  quest 
was  a  failure.  At  last  they  departed  from  the  place  to 
gether;  neither  daring  to  trust  the  other  there  after 
he  should  himself  be  gone. 

The  next  year  the  search  was  renewed  by  both  men, 
but  at  different  times;  and  renewed  again  and  again 
in  the  aftertime.  But  after  that  first  meeting  on  the 
mountain,  they  never  chanced  to  encounter  one  another 
there ;  which  was  perhaps  fortunate,  for  their  animosity 
toward  each  other  grew  with  the  years. 

Neither  of  them  ever  found  the  slab  of  pure  lead 
that  stood  for  a  mine— or  which  to  them  represented 
a  mountain  that  might  well  be,  for  all  they  knew,  of 
solid  lead,  and  might  form  the  bulk  of  the  mountain. 
Prospecting  year  after  year,  neither  of  them  ever  came 
upon  any  sign  that  spoke  of  lead  in  any  form  or  any 


In  Miners9  Mirage  Land 


quantity.  It  seemed  strange  that  neither  of  them,  af 
ter  so  many  years  of  searching  should  fail  in  their  quest  ; 
for  both  claimed  such  accurate  knowledge  of  the  exact 
locality.  Yet— if  you  will  but  think  of  it  in  so  favor 
able  light— the  reason  is  not  hard  to  find.  Only  you 
must  not  be  of  a  sceptical  turn  of  mind.  It  is  this: 
The  Missourian  was  forever  declaring  that  Forman 
had  covered  it  up  to  keep  him  from  finding  it. 
And  Forman  always  said  the  same  of  the  Missourian. 


Forman's 
Find 


The 

Lessons 

of 

the 

Desert, 


THE  LESSONS  OF  THE  DESERT. 

IT  a  little  flour,  a  piece  of  bacon,  a 
handful  of  coffee,  one's  blankets,  enough 
clothing  for  comfort — that  is  all.  When 
one  stops  to  think  of  it,  it  is  astonishing 
to  find  how  little  one  really  needs,  to  live. 
It  is  only  after  you  have  been  on  a  rough 
trip  of  weeks,  when  it  was  needful  that  you  should  de 
bate  well  and  long  over  not  every  pound,  but  literally 
every  ounce  of  extra  weight  that  you  were  to  carry — 
casting  aside  all  things  but  those  that  were  vital  to  your 
absolute  needs— that  you  came  to  realize  how  much 
useless  stuff  one  goes  through  life  a-burdened  with. 

I  have  a  friend— an  Indian— who  tells  me  he  would 
be  more  apt  to  think  the  White  Man  a  great  man,  were 
he  not  forced  to  see  he  is  a  fool— for  doing  fool  things. 
"Heap  big  fool,"  he  says.  He  says  that  the  White 
Man  voluntarily  strives  for  the  acquisition  of  such 
things  as  bring  but  added  care  into  one's  measure  of 
days;  which  is  fool's  work.  Then  he  says;  that  to 
breathe  full  and  strong,  and  to  have  a  straight  back, 
and  carry  the  head  high,  one  must  not  bear  a  load. 
And  that  to  have  long  years  of  peace,  and  to  live  glad 
ly,  one  must  not  do  the  things  that  "make  worry." 

So  he  asks  me  why  the  White  Man  (who  thinks 
himself  wise  because  of  his  different  color)  should— of 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


53 


his  own  free  will— make  of  himself  a  burden-bearer; 
and  so  be  less  wise  (in  the  eyes  of  the  Brown  Man)  than 
his  Indian  brother,  whom  he— in  his  heart— calls  a 
fool?  But  I  have  been  unable  to  make  answer  to  that; 
because  I,  too,  have  also  asked  myself:  "Why,  in 
deed!" 

Now,  the  least  of  us  know  that  the  possession  of  one 
thing  calls  for  the  immediate  acquirement  of  some  other 
thing  to  supplement  it.  And  then,  to  that  one,  must 
be  added  another  to  answer  the  new  demands  the  lat 
ter  creates.  And  the  third  calls  even  more  insistently 
for  a  fourth;  and  so  on— forever  and  forever— the  last 
one  calling  for  still  another,  if  we  are  of  those  fools 
who  listen  to  the  cry  of  their  folly  for  more,  and  yet 
more. 

And,  if  we  only  found  satisfaction  in  the  pampering 
and  pleasing  of  the  tastes  and  desires  we  encourage! 
But  we  don't.  So  that  the  Indian  has  license  to  laugh 
at  our  ways,  when  we  ourselves  can  give  no  rational 
excuse  for  what  we  are  doing,  and  keep  doing.  We 
burden  ourselves  with  things  that  we  buy,  with  no  other 

excuse  for  the  act  than "They  are  the  things  other 

folk  have ! "  So  we  go  on  getting  and  getting,  whether 
we  want  them  or  no.  Very  like  sheep  that  follow  the 
sheep  with  the  bell,  are  we. 

And  I  wonder  if  he  who  follows  the  bell-wether  is 
any  wiser  than  that  one  who  trails  after  the  story  of 
a  will-o'-wisp  mine  that  leads  him  across  Desert  val 
leys  and  rough  mountain  ridges  where  there  is  never 
a  sign  of  gold?  Which  is  the  fool;  and  which  is  the 
wise  man?  And  who  has  the  right  to  judge? 

You  may  jeer  and  deride  as  you  will,  but  the  old 
prospectors  do  not  care.  They  go  their  ways,  letting 
you  alone;  and  they  ask,  in  return,  that  you  let  them 


The 

Lessons 

of 

the 

Desert, 


54 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


The 

Lessons 

of 

the 

Desert. 


alone  also.  They  will  give  you  help  if  you  need  it; 
but  they  will  ask  nothing  from  you. 

Their  needs  are  so  few  that  they  want  but  little  to 
live ;  and  that  they  can  earn.  They  have  little ;  but  they 
can  earn  a  little  by  work.  So  it  happens  that  those 
who  know  them  may  give— now  and  then— of  their 
own  stores,  asking  no  toll  for  what  they  may  do.  Yet 
the  kindness  does  not  go  unpaid.  For,  you  must  remem 
ber  that  these  live  in  the  Desert ;  and  the  Desert  teaches 
one  how  to  forget  self.  The  help  that  an  extra  pair 
of  hands  can  give  to  those  who  live  in  the  far  places 
where  men  do  not  congregate,  is  much;  and  for  what 
is  done  for  a  comrade  there,  one  gets  payment  in  labor 
that  is  done  with  a  willing  hand— not  because  payment 
is  exacted  or  expected,  but  because  there  is  that  in  the 
blood  of  those  who  live  there,  that  teaches  them  to  be 
grateful. 

It  is  only  in  those  places  where  human  life  is  hived 
in  houses  that  touch  elbows,  so  close  are  they  huddled 
together,  that  one  holds  out  one's  hand  for  the  final 
dimes  and  nickels  in  the  payment  of  debts;  or  for  the 
ultimate  and  absolute  settlement  of  each  and  every  ob 
ligation  incurred.  True,  when  you  have  become  one 
with  them  that  live  there,  you,  too,  fall  into  their  ways ; 
yet  it  is  a  good  thing  to  remember  that  there  are  places 
—lonely  and  far  though  they  be— where  one  may  find 
those  who  have  souls  that  are  not  shrivelled  and  dry; 
wrinkled  and  weather-worn  men  who  are  great  of  heart, 
and  who  would  give  half  of  their  little  all  to  you  in 
your  need,  and  with  never  a  thought  that  payment  was 
due. 

So,  in  this  way,  and  because  of  the  fellowship  there, 
the  mirage-miners  manage  to  live— to  buy  the  few 
things  that  even  a  simple  life  makes  needfuL 

A  little  flour,  a  piece  of  bacon,  a  handful  of  coffee, 


In  Miners9   Mirage-Lana 


55 


your  blankets,  and  such  clothing  as  the  season  calls 
you  to  wear. 

Then  to  live  in  the  big,  still  plains  that  inspire  a  big, 
serene  life,  learning  the  best  the  Desert  can  teach  you 
— these  things,  namely: 

That  we  are  what  we  think  and  feel,  not  what  others 
think  and  feel  us  to  be ;  and  that  in  such  wise  does  God 
surely  judge  us.  That  mankind  is  a  brotherhood,  each 
needing  the  other,  and  that  not  one  can  be  spared  from 
the  unit ;  brothers  are  we,  born  of  a  common  parentage, 
and  you  shall  know  there  is  small  difference  between 
man  and  man,  except  in  so  far  as  they  are  good  or  bad 
— not  as  the  veneer  of  environment  makes  them.  That 
we  shall  be  more  censorious  of  our  own  faults — less 
critical  of  the  failings  or  follies  of  others. 

To  feel  that  the  best  life  is  the  simple  life ;  and,  if  one 
can,  to  live  it  out  in  such  a  companionship  somewhere 
that  you  may  have  the  great  stretches  of  earth  as  God 
gives;  to  read — as  from  printed  pages — in  the  grains 
of  the  far-reaching  sand;  to  listen  to  a  speech  that  is 
voiced  by  the  stars  and  the  four  winds. 

All  these  belong  to  the  men  who  live  there;  so  that 
it  is  hardly  worth  while  to  try  to  make  the  old  pros 
pectors  give  up  their  quests  and  go  back  to  the  places 
where  people  live.  Even  if  the  fairy  stories  of  the 
fabulous  mines  were  true,  and  they  should,  some  day, 
find  each  his  own  treasure,  I  doubt  if  the  end  of  the 
search  would  bring  joy.  To  have  money  in  the  Des 
ert,  makes  little  change  in  one's  ways  of  living.  And 

to  go  back  to  cities !  They  are  alien  to  all  the 

cities  could  give.  So,  the  joy  of  life,  for  them,  lies  in 
the  search  for— not  in  the  finding  of  gold. 


The 

Lessons 

of 

the 

Desert* 


The 
Marvel 
ous 

Hardin 
SUver 


THE  MARVELOUS  HAEDIN  SILVER. 

INGE  that  far  time  when  Fremont 
found  himself  under  the  lee  of  Black 
Rock,  one  gloomy  New  Year's  day,  the 
sullen  and  bare  promontory  has  been 
guide  and  landmark  to  thousands  of  voy 
agers  crossing  the  great  American  Sa 
hara.  Westward  more  than  half  a  hundred  miles  from 
the  Central  Pacific  Railroad's  traveled  ways  that  go 
through  Humboldt  County,  Nevada,  lies  Quin  River 
Desert— forbidding  and  grim— and  Black  Rock  rises 
abruptly  from  its  levels.  It  is  a  dark  and  unfriendly 
looking  point,  with  all  the  gruesomeness  Fremont  de 
scribes;  but  through  all  the  years  the  emigrant  wound 
his  way  toward  the  State  that  sees  the  setting  sun  sink 
downward  to  touch  salt  water,  it  has  been  his  unfailing 
friend.  For  once  seen,  there  is  no  mistaking  Black 
Rock  for  any  other  landmark  ever  described,  and  to  the 
wayfarer  across  the  vast,  lonely  land,  it  was  compass 
and  star.  The  range  of  mountains  from  which  it  juts  is 
of  gnarled  and  misshapen  masses  of  lava  rock  mixed 
with  miles  of  ashes.  About,  are  vast  stretches  of  alkali 
plain,  of  whitened  hummocks  of  hardened  earth,  of 
wide  reaches  of  sand  flats  swept  into  waves  by  the 
wind. 

It  is  all  fierce,  hard  and  repellant.    Farther  away  the 
mountains  bear  rocks  that  burst  into  color>  and  their 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


57 


broken  and  rainbow-hued  bits  besprinkle  the  "washes" 
in  the  foothills.  Their  graveled  floors  are  thick  strewn 
with  variegated  flakes  of  beauty— dark  blue  and  light 
blue,  purple  and  pink;  a  green  that  is  like  to  emeralds, 
and  ruby  and  amber  in  all  their  beauty  of  clarity  and 
coloring.  And  where  these  jasper  fragments  are  not, 
are  burned  and  black  volcanic  boulders;  and  then  you 
will  come  across  places  thickly  strewn  with  fragments 
of  vivid  red  rock— rock  that  is  red  as  if  blood-stained; 
and  you  say  to  yourself:  "Why  this  is  the  waste  and 
refuse  from  nature's  great  brick-yards!"  so  like  unto 
that  artificial  building  material  does  it  seem. 

All  through  this  weird  and  wonderful  valley,  where 
white  plumes  of  steaming  springs  wave  here  and  there 
along  the  foothills,  are  things  to  hold  your  curious  at 
tention — acres  of  obsidian,  others  of  petrified  wood; 
turquoise,  geodes,  onyx,  and  a  thousand  other  things 
beneath  your  horse's  crunching  hoofs,  to  make  the  rid 
ing  of  this  range  well  worth  your  while. 

Away  back  in  1849  a  long  train  of  emigrant  wagons, 
fourteen  in  number,  was  crossing  the  plains  on  its 
journey  to  the  West.  Following  the  Humboldt  river 
down  the  valley  of  the  same  name,  at  the  Lassen  Mea 
dows  they  found  so  little  feed  for  their  stock,  where 
the  stock  of  the  emigrant  usually  grazed  for  a  day  or 
so,  that  the  travelers  decided  upon  abandoning  that 
route  and,  instead,  crossing  over  toward  Black  Rock, 
and  following  the  old  Lassen  road  into  California.  But 
at  Black  Rock,  also,  they  found  but  scant  feed  when 
they  arrived.  So  they  pushed  on  six  miles  farther  to 
make  camp,  and  rest,  at  those  water  demons  called 
Double  Hot  Springs.  About  that  steaming  twin  vent- 
hole  of  the  old  Earth's  anger  was  always  to  be  found 
grass  green  and  growing— grass  moist  with  steam-pearls, 
and  of  the  tender  hue  of  hot-houss  plants.  Go  there 


The 
Marvel 
ous 
Hardin 
Silver 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


The 
Marvel* 

ous 

Hordin 
Silver 


when  you  will,  you  will  find  such  sweetly  fresh  vege 
tation — sparkling  with  the  ever-moist  breath  of  the 
springs— that  you  leave  it  with  regret  to  take  up  your 
journey  again  through  the  baked  plain  with  its  lep- 
rous-like  spots  of  alkali. 

At  Double  Hot  Springs  they  made  a  temporary  camp 
to  give  the  stock  the  opportunity  to  rest  and  recover 
from  the  journey  thus  far  passed.  Brown  men  with  bow 
in  hand,  and  the  soft  tread  of  a  wildcat,  were  all  about 
the  emigrant  in  those  days;  but  at  the  springs  there 
was  no  shelter  under  which  an  Indian  could  creep  upon 
them,  so  they  made  a  halt  of  a  number  of  days  there. 

Their  next  move  was  to  Mud  Meadows,  around  on 
the  farther  side  of  the  range. 

Now  it  so  happened  that  on  the  day  they  broke 
camp  there,  three  of  the  party  were  deputized  to  hunt 
along  the  mountain  ridge  for  game  to  replenish  the 
well-nigh  depleted  larders  of  the  camp-wagons.  It 
was  their  custom  to  have  two  or  three  hunters-  each 
"crew"  taking  its  turn— go  out,  when  the  meat  sup 
ply  was  low,  to  kill  such  game  as  the  country  afforded. 
These  three  were  directed  to  hunt  along  the  moun 
tain  tops,  while  the  wagons  worked  their  way  up  the 
valley's  edge  to  Mud  Meadows  where,  later,  they  would 
all  meet. 

One  of  the  three  hunters  selected  for  that  occasion 
was  a  man  named  Hardin,  a  wheelwright  and  black 
smith  by  trade.  He  was  an  uncle  of  J.  A.  Hardin,  of 
Petaluma,  California,  a  well-known  cattle  man  of  that 
State  and  Nevada. 

The  hunters  were  to  cross  a  near-lying  mountain, 
and  then  go  over  to  the  farther  side  to  join  the  wagons. 
In  leaving  their  camp  at  Double  Hot  Springs  they 
crossed,  first,  a  piece  of  tableland,  and  then  made  their 
way  to  the  higher  parts  of  the  mountain.  No  game 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


59 


was  seen.  Keeping  along  the  east  side  of  the  mountain 
for  some  distance,  they  finally  worked  their  way  up 
ward  to  the  summit,  from  whence  they  had  an  un 
obstructed  view  of  the  valley. 

Then  they  discovered  they  had  lost  their  bearings, 
for  no  sign  of  the  wagons  was  to  be  seen.  They  were 
about  to  descend  to  the  plain  to  find  (where  the  wagons 
had  passed)  the  wheel-tracks,  and  so  follow  them  into 
camp,  when  they  espied,  away  down  the  Desert,  a  team 
that  had  stopped  on  the  road.  The  three  hunters— 
glad  in  this  lonely  land,  to  find  a  fellow  voyager— at 
once  started  down  the  mountain  side,  heading  directly 
for  the  halted  wagon  below. 

They  had  gone,  perhaps,  a  third  of  the  way  when 
of  a  sudden  they  found  themselves  floundering  through 
a  soft,  gray  deposit  like  sifted  ashes,  in  which  at  every 
step  they  sunk  ankle-deep.  And  here  in  the  powdery 
stuff,  was  embedded  something  which  shone  so  bright 
ly  in  the  sun  that  their  gaze  was  arrested,  and  the  far 
away  team,  for  the  time,  forgotten.  One  of  the  trio 
had,  years  before,  been  in  the  Mexican  War,  and  after 
receiving  his  discharge  had  been  employed  on  the  pack- 
trains  of  the  famous  Potosi  mine  for  some  time  before 
leaving  that  country.  He  instantly  recognized  the 
great  slabs  of  whitish  metal  as  melted  silver— and 
perfectly  pure,  so  far  as  he  could  judge.  It  looked  as 
though  the  awful  fires  that  had  scattered  the  lava  rock 
over  the  land  and  burned  and  blackened  the  face  of 
the  country  in  some  places — or  blanched  it  in  others 
in  the  blaze  of  flames  we  wot  not  of — had  run  the  metal 
white-hot  through  the  ashes  that  covered  that  side  of 
the  mountain  for  several  hundred  square  feet.  Every 
where  it  was  sticking  up— pieces  protruding  that  were 
the  size  of  bricks— others  in  uneven  masses  of  four  or 
five  feet  long. 


The 
Marvel 
ous 
Hardin 
Silver 


6o 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 
Marvel- 

cms 
Hardin 

Silver 


One  is  slow  to  realize  good  fortune,  and  they  could 
but  vaguely  comprehend  the  meaning  of  what  they 
saw.  Then  gathering  up  all  they  could  carry,  they 
started  down  the  mountain  to  the  place  on  the  plain 
where  they  could  still  see  the  wagon  stopping  by  the 
way.  Arriving  there  they  found  an  emigrant  and  his 
wife  and  child,  who  had  been  overtaken  by  disaster, 
for  their  oxen — all  but  one  yoke — were  dead,  and  there 
were  yet  many  miles  to  travel  ere  they  could  reach 
California.  The  man  was  engaged  in  trying  to  re 
model  his  wagon  to  fit  the  circumstances  of  his  mis 
fortune.  He  was  cutting  down  his  wagon  from  a  four- 
wheeler  to  a  cart,  that  the  remaining  yoke  of  weak, 
half-famished  cattle  might  be  able  to  draw  it,  loaded 
with  their  most  important  belongings,  the  rest  of  the 
journey,  on  and  into  the  Land  of  Gold. 

The  excited  Hardin  showed  them  his  find,  and  told 
them  of  the  uncountable  wealth  they  had  discovered; 
and  then  asked  the  emigrant  to  take  as  many  of  their 
precious  slabs  into  California  as  his  wagon  (after  being 
cut  down)  would  carry.  But  in  vain  did  he  and  his 
companions  plead.  Not  even  the  promise  that  he  should 
share  equally  with  the  others  had  any  effect  on  the  man 
who  kept  busy  with  hammer  and  saw.  They  poured 
out  their  glowing  wonder-tale,  but  he  remained  un 
moved. 

"Silver!"  he  exclaimed,  at  last,  straightening  him 
self  from  his  work.  "Maybe  'tis,  and  maybe  'tisn't. 
But  I  wouldn't  do  what  you  ask,  even  if  it  was  solid 
gold !  If  I  can  get  through  to  California  with  my  little 
family  alive,  and  with  such  things  as  we  must  have, 
it  will  be  all  that  I  can  do.  I've  got  to  leave  the  bulk 
of  my  belongings  here  on  the  road,  because  I  can't 
carry  them  in  a  cut-down  wagon.  No,  Friends,  you'll 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


61 


get  no  help  from  me;  for  all  the  silver  in  the  world 
wouldn't  help  me  in  my  present  predicament." 

Finding  all  importunities  of  no  avail,  they  threw  the 
largest  piece— the  one  Hardin  himself  had  been  carry 
ing—down  by  the  roadside.  The  remainder  was  then 
divided  among  the  three  and  they  started  for  Mud 
Meadows,  where  they  arrived  long  after  dark.  There 
they  showed  their  marvelous  "find";  and  the  stir  the 
shining  stuff  made,  as  it  was  passed  from  hand  to  hand, 
was  excuse  for  the  wild  rejoicing  of  the  two  hundred 
emigrants,  which  was  continued  by  the  camp  fire, 
more  or  less,  all  night.  There  was  cause  enough  for  re 
joicing;  for  Hardin  had  declared  there  was  enough  of 
that  silver  in  sight  to  load  all  fourteen  of  the  wagons. 
So  one  and  all  declared  that  so  soon  as  they  could  prop 
erly  equip  themselves  for  a  return  trip  and  the  trans 
portation  of  the  silver,  they  would  come  back  into  this 
Desert-land  of  treasure  that  seemed  beyond  the  most 
extravagant  of  dreams. 

The  following  morning  they  left  Mud  Meadows,  re 
suming  their  journey  toward  the  West.  Whether  by 
accident  or  not,  no  one  can  say,  but  some  pieces  of  the 
silver  were  left  where  they  had  camped  that  night,  and 
were  found  later  by  others  making  camp  there. 

The  emigrants  found  no  further  signs  of  silver  or  of 
other  metals,  and  finally  reached  California,  where  the 
story  of  Hardin 's  find  spread,  as  the  emigrants  repeated 
the  tale.  The  three  men,  however,  kept  the  secret  of 
the  exact  locality  where  they  had  found  this  marvel 
ous  deposit.  They  were  impatient  to  return  at  once, 
but  the  growing  depredations  of  hostile  Indians,  as 
well  as  other  affairs,  deterred  them.  As  soon  as  all 
arrangements  could  be  made,  and  traveling  in  that  land 
of  the  murderous  arrow  was  safe,  they  would  go;  but 


The 

Marvel- 

ous 
Hardin 

Silver 


62 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


The 
Marvel- 

ous 
Hordin 
Silver 


it  was  many  a  month  thereafter  before  they  could  put 
their  plans  into  execution. 

Among  those  who,  on  that  memorable  trip  into  the 
West,  had  seen  the  marvelous  silver,  was  Steve  Bass— 
so  well  known  the  West  through— and  his  brother. 
They  had  seen  it,  handled  it  and  had  heard  Hardin  tell 
the  tale  over  and  over  again.  And  Bass  himself  often 
told  how  he  had  seen  Hardin  melt  some  of  the  bits  into 
silver  buttons.  Taking  an  axe  handle— it  being  of  hard 
wood  that  would  not  ignite  easily— Hardin  hollowed 
a  little  place  in  the  side  of  it,  and  laid  therein  bits  of 
the  silver  which  he  had  previously  cut  from  the  larger 
pieces  of  the  metal,  with  his  pocket  knife.  He  then 
covered  these  over  with  live  coals,  and  by  blowing 
steadily  on  them  for  some  time,  the  silver  was  melted 
into  a  button— one  that  he  carried  in  his  pocket  for 
years  afterward.  And  subsequently,  when  telling  the 
tale  of  the  fabulous  find  to  a  collector  of  minerals  and 
curiosities,  he  showed  him  this  button.  Interested  in 
its  history,  the  man  bought  it  of  Hardin  and  took  it 
to  England,  where,  no  doubt,  it  is  now  in  some  collec 
tion  of  minerals  and  curios,  on  the  shelves  of  an  Eng 
lishman's  cabinet. 

Hardin  settled  in  Petaluma  and  opened  a  wagon 
shop,  doing  blacksmithing  and  such  work.  Men  con 
gregated  there  in  the  early  days  to  "swap"  mining 
stories;  and  one  day  when  some  one  began  talking  to 
Hardin  of  his  discovery  away  back  on  the  plains,  a 
new-comer— a  man  named  A.  B.  Jennison,  who  had 
just  come  in  from  Rogue  River,  to  settle  in  the  val 
ley—exclaimed  : 

"Why,  I've  heard  that  same  story  told  by  another 
man — one  of  the  three  who  found  it.  I  knew  him  well. 
But  he  declares  that  he's  found  since  he  got  to  Cali 
fornia  that  other  men  know  of  gold  in  quantities  as 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


great  as  was  the  deposit  of  that  silver,  and  that  he  is 
going  to  look  here  for  gold,  instead  of  going  back  there 
to  get  a  less  valuable  mineral— and  perhaps  be  butch 
ered  by  the  Indians,  in  the  bargain." 

Hostilities  were  increasing  back  on  the  emigrant  roads 
where  the  brown  man  watched  for  the  wayfarer  from  his 
hiding-place  in  the  rocks,  and  the  Desert  country  had 
no  great  attraction  for  miners  who  believed  in  like  for 
tunes  being  found  farther  toward  the  West,  and  in 
more  settled  districts.  But  there  were  those  whom  the 
Hardin  Silver  lured,  and  of  these  was  a  doctor  who  had 
come  to  his  knowledge  of  it  through  another  source. 

In  1859  this  doctor  came  into  the  Honey  Lake  coun 
try,  and  took  up  his  home  in  the  lower  end  of  the  val 
ley.  He  was  a  silent,  uncommunicative  sort  of  a  man, 
and  had  no  confidants.  In  those  troublous  times  there 
were  many  desperate  characters  about,  In  that  local 
ity.  If  a  man  knew  aught  of  any  valuable  possession 
—whether  of  something  material  or  only  a  secret  knowl 
edge  of  things— he  was  very  careful  in  his  selection  of 
those  in  whom  he  reposed  confidence. 

The  doctor  had  no  doubt  of  being  able,  some  time, 
to  trace  his  way  back  to  a  place  on  the  plains  where 
he  had  once  seen  something,  the  value  of  which  he  had 
not  known  till  long  afterward.  The  years  went  by,  and 
he  said  nothing  of  it  to  any  man.  He  was  certain  of  a 
treasure-house  there  in  the  Desert;  and  the  time  would 
come  when  he  would  be  able  to  go  a-search  for  it,  tucked 
away  somewhere  in  the  mountains.  He  could  wait. 

It  was  in  1852,  when  crossing  the  Desert  near  Mud 
Meadows,  just  after  Hardin 's  party  had  passed  through, 
that  the  doctor  had  found  lying  by  the  roadside  where 
Hardin  had  dropped  it,  the  larger  piece  of  silver  that 
the  emigrant  had  refused  to  carry  for  him— that  lone 
emigrant  whom  Hardin  had  left  cutting  down  his 


The 
Marvel 


ous 


SUver 


64 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 
Marvel- 

ous 
Hardln 
Silver 


wagon.  At  the  time  of  finding  it,  the  doctor  had  failed 
to  recognize  its  value,  and  so  had  left  it  there.  But— 
many  months  afterward— he  came  to  know  that  it  had 
been  pure  silver  that  he  had  held  in  his  hands.  Others 
who  camped  there  later,  and  were  questioned  about  it, 
knew  nothing  of  any  such  thing  being  there;  so  that 
it  is  not  known  who  took  it  away  from  the 
place  where  it  lay  in  plain  sight.  Probably  it  was 
picked  up  by  some  one  who  knew  as  little  of  its  value 
as  did  the  doctor.  Or  it  might  have  been  some  one  who 
did  indeed  know  its  value,  and  to  this  day  is  seeking 
the  place  from  whence  it  came — as  so  many  other  pros 
pectors  have  done,  and  are  still  doing. 

The  doctor  finally  laid  plans  for  the  return  trip  to  this 
spot  where  he  so  well  remembered  having  seen  the 
melted  silver ;  but  the  very  month  set  for  his  start  found 
him  sick— sick  unto  death.  When  he  realized  that  re 
covery  was  impossible,  he  called  two  of  his  friends  to 
him,  and  there  on  his  death  bed  told  Tommy  Harvey 
and  George  Lathrop  all  he  knew  of  it,  and  of  the  local 
ity  where  it  could,  no  doubt,  be  found.  Even  to  the 
minutest  particulars  he  described  that  place  in  Desert- 
land  where  he  had  held  in  his  hand  what  he  believed 
to  be  the  key  to  a  treasure-house  of  uncounted  wealth. 

"If  I  could  only  have  lived  long  enough  to  go  there, 
myself,"  he  said.  "If  it  had  only  been  safe  for  a  man 
to  go  there  at  any  time  since  I  saw  that  country,  I  know 
I  should  have  found  the  ledge  itself —I  know  from  what 
I  have  heard  Hardin  and  others  tell,  that  I  could  have 
gone  directly  to  it." 

So  the  doctor  died— one  of  the  many  who  believed 
in  the  mirage-mine— if  it  be  but  a  mirage-mine,  yet  who 
knows?— and  the  two  who  went  found  nothing.  The 
mountains  were  so  many,  and  so  bewildering. 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Nor  was  the  doctor  the  only  one  who,  in  crossing  the 
plains,  found  evidence  of  the  truth  of  Hardin 's  story, 
there  where  the  old  camping  ground  had  been.  One 
party  of  emigrants,  in  particular,  made  their  camp 
near  Mud  Meadows,  in  the  spring  of  1852;  and  there 
they,  too,  found  some  of  the  smaller  pieces  of  silver 
that  Hardin  and  his  companions  had  dropped.  They 
gathered  together  all  they  could  find,  though  it  was  but 
a  small  amount,  and  took  it  to  the  town  of  Shasta  with 
them.  There,  it  was  bought  by  a  jeweler  by  the  name 
of  Lewin,  who  paid  for  it  by  giving  in  exchange  its 
weight  in  Mexican  dollars.  He  displayed  it  in  the  win 
dow  of  his  jewelry  store;  and  there  it  was  seen  by 
scores  of  people — among  them  such  men  as  L.  D.  Vary, 
Governor  Roop,  and  others  whose  word  was  relied  upon 
as  of  those  who  "speak  of  a  verity,"  and  who  have 
many  a  time  since  told  of  having  seen  the  Hardin  Sil 
ver  with  their  own  eyes.  It  attracted  much  attention 
by  reason  of  its  romantic  history,  until  the  store  was 
burned.  Yet,  in  raking  over  the  ashes  when  they  had 
cooled,  Lewin  found  it  there — a  melted  mass  of  smoke- 
blackened  metal. 

Hardin  dreaded  (as  who  did  not  dread  in  those  days 
when  the  Indian  held  the  Desert?)  to  undertake  the 
hardships  and  perils  of  a  trip,  even  though  it  held  out 
such  glorious  promise  of  fortune  quickly  made.  Peo 
ple  who  crossed  the  plains  in  the  old  days  were  not 
eager  to  retrace  their  steps  immediately,  or  to  repeat 
their  experiences.  Hardin  felt,  too,  that  the  treasure 
was  safe  though  he  might  not  go  to  it  at  once.  But, 
finally— in  1858— he  determined  to  hazard  Indians  and 
like  evils,  and  to  retrace  his  way  to  where  in  ashes  and 
lava  lay  those  great  blocks  of  silver— no  one  knew  how 
many,  no  one  could  guess. 

On  this  trip  he   took   with   him,    as    a   precaution 


The 
Marvel 
ous 
Hardin 

Silver 


66 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


The 

Marvel 
ous 
Hardin 
SQver 


against  any  surprises  from  Indians,  two  men,  one  of 
whom  was  named  Alberding.  When,  at  length,  they 
arrived  at  Double  Hot  Springs,  Hardin  looked  ahead 
and  saw  Black  Rock  point — the  monument  he  so  well 
remembered— that  was  the  landmark  of  the  wondrous 
slabs  of  silver.  Pointing  to  it,  he  said  to  his  com 
panions  : 

"Look  ahead,  boys!  Do  you  see  that  spring  on  the 
hillside?"  (It  was  afterward  named  "Ram's  Horn 
Spring"  by  the  later  emigrants,  and  is  known  by  that 
name  today.)  "Do  you  see  the  canon  that  lies  below 
it?  I'll  tell  you  this,  now;  I  didn't  find  the  silver  be 
low  that  place ;  nor  did  I  Snd  it  more  than  half  a  mile 
above;  and  it  is  somewhere  there  at  the  left." 

They  all  went  to  the  spot  he  had  indicated.  They 
searched  and  searched.  Up  and  down,  back  and  forth, 
and  retracing  their  steps  again  and  again,  as  they 
looked  for  the  strange  ash  deposit.  Of  silver  there  was 
no  sign.  Even  ash  there  was  none.  The  face  of  the 
mountain  seemed  completely  changed.  Waterspouts 
and  cloudbursts  are  of  frequent  occurrence  in  that 
country,  and  now  there  were  deep  gullies  and  cuts  that 
had  not  been  there  before.  The  whole  surface  of  the 
mountain  had  altered  beyond  recognition. 

Avalanches  of  broken,  sliding  rock  had  been  set 
moving  downward  by  the  restless  elements,  and  what 
had  been  bare  ground  before  was  now  hidden  under 
tons  of  boulders  and  smaller  bits  of  rock.  Avalanches 
of  water  had  bared  rocks  once  covered  with  earth. 
Moving — shifting — changing  with  the  years,  nothing 
was  now  the  same.  No  sign  of  silver  was  ever  seen 
in  that  mountain  again,  either  then  or  thereafter. 

So,  at  last,  Hardin  and  his  companions  went  away. 
He  knew  the  silver  was  there;  but  it  was  to  be  his— 
never. 

Others  came,  after  them,  and  the  search  went  on. 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 
Marvel- 


oiis 


Silver 


Several  prospecting  parties  were  there  in  1859,  and 
again  in  the  '60 's;  and  year  after  year,  even  down  to 
our  own  day,  do  they  go. 

There  have  been  those  (guided  by  a  divining  rod 
that  showed  them,  they  aver,  the  exact  spot  where  the 
stream  of  molten  metal  flowed  and  cooled  in  its  bed  of  Har<Jjn 
ashes)  who  have  put  minted  silver  by  the  thousands 
into  the  mountain  in  tunnels,  and  shafts,  and  inclines 
driven  and  sunk  in  absolute  faith  in  the  hidden  treasure 
of  the  heights.  Silver  a-plenty  has  been  sunk,  but  none 
ever  brought  to  light. 

Every  summer  sees  one  or  more  wagons,  carrying 
prospectors,  crawling  across  the  furnace-hot  alkali 
levels  that  border  the  Black  Rock  land.  The  mirage 
of  Quin  River  Desert  dances  about  them,  as  the  mirage 
of  Hardin  Mountain  beckons  them  on. 

And  though  they  always  return  with  empty  palms, 
hope  is  never  absent  from  them ;  and  they  will  tell  you 
that  some  one,  some  day,  somewhere  in  that  grim,  still 
mountain  that  even  the  birds  shun,  will  find  the  lost 
treasure  vault  the  three  men  stumbled  on  that  day  in 
the  long  ago. 

Perhaps.  I  do  not  know.  Such  is  the  story  of  the 
marvelous  Hardin  Silver — the  story  just  as  I  heard 
it  out  by  the  foothills  of  the  grim  old  mountain,  and  by 
the  dry  Desert-sea  that  creeps  up  to  its  feet.  If  you 
hacl  heard  it  in  that  strange  land  you  would  not  have 
marveled  at  the  strangeness  of  the  tale,  but  would  have 
had  the  faith  that  the  others  have  had,  no  matter  how 
you  might  have  doubted  when— afterward— you  had 
shaken  off  the  mystery  and  charm  of  the  Desert. 

I  give  you  the  story  just  as  I  got  it.  Believe  it  or 
not,  as  you  choose. 

"I  dare  not  say  how  true  't  may  be— 
I  tell  the  tale  as  'twas  told  to  me." 


The 

Lure 

of 

the 

Desert* 


THE  LURE  OF  THE  DESERT. 

XCEPT  you  are  kindred  with  those  who 
have  speech  with  great  spaces,  and  the 
Four  Winds  of  the  earth,  and  the  infinite 
arch  of  God's  sky,  you  shall  not  have 
understanding  of  the  Desert's  lure. 

It  is  not  the  Desert's  charm  that 
calls  one.  What  is  it?  I  know  not;  only  that  there  is 
a  low,  insistent  voice  calling— calling— calling.  Not  a 
loud  voice.  The  Desert  proclaiming  itself,  speaks  gent 
ly.  And  we— every  child  of  us  who  has  laid  on  the 
breast  of  a  mother  while  she  rocked  slowly,  and  hushed 
our  fretting  with  a  soft-sung  lullaby  song— we  know 
how  a  low  voice  soothes  and  lulls  one  into  sleep. 

You  are  tired  of  the  world's  ways?  Then,  if  you 
and  the  Desert  have  found  each  other,  surely  you  will 
feel  the  drawing  of  your  soul  toward  the  eternal  calm 
—the  brooding  peace  that  is  there  in  the  gray  country. 
Does  the  beautiful  in  Nature  thrill  you  to  your  fin 
ger-tips?  When  your  eye  is  so  trained  that  it  may  dis 
cover  the  beauty  that  dwells  in  that  vast,  still  corner 
of  the  world,  and  your  ear  is  attuned  to  catch  the  mu 
sic  of  the  plains  or  the  anthems  sung  in  deep  canons 
by  the  winds;  when  your  heart  finds  comradeship  in 
the  mountains  and  the  great  sand-seas,  the  sun  and  the 
stars,  and  the  huge  cloud-drifts  that  the  Desert  winds 
set  a-rolling  round  the  world— when  all  these  reach 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


your  heart  by  way  of  your  eye  and  your  ear,  then  you 
shall  find  one  of  the  alluring  ways  that  belongs  to  the 
Desert. 

Do  you  seek  for  the  marvelous?  Or  do  you  go  a-quest 
for  riches?  Or  simply  desire  to  wander  away  into  little 
known  rifts  in  the  wilderness?  By  these  lures  and  a 
hundred  others  will  the  Desert  draw  you  there.  And 
once  there,  unprejudiced,  the  voice  by  and  by  will 
make  itself  heard  as  it  whispers  at  your  ear.  And  when 
you  can  lay  your  head  on  its  breast,  and  hear  its 
heart-beats,  you  will  know  a  rest  that  is  absolute  and 
infinite.  Then,  you  will  understand  those  who  yearly 
go  a-searching  for  the  mythical  mines  of  mirage-land, 
and  those  who  have  lived  apart  from  others  for  a  life 
time,  and  are  forgot  by  all  their  kindred  and  friends 
of  a  half-century  ago.  You  will  say:  "It  is  the  Des 
ert's  lure.  I  know— they  cannot  help  it.  And— yes!— 
it  is  worth  all  the  penalty  the  gray  land  makes  them 
pay!" 

If  you  go  to  the  Desert,  and  live  there,  you  learn  to 
love  it.  If  you  go  away,  you  will  never  forget  it  for 
one  instant  in  after  life;  it  will  be  with  you  in  memory 
forever  and  forever.  And  always  will  you  hear  the 
still  voice  that  lures  one,  calling— and  calling. 

"The  Desert  calls  to  him  who  has  once  felt  its  strange 
attraction,  calls  and  compels  him  to  return,  as  the  sea 
compels  the  sailor  to  forsake  the  land.  He  who  has 
once  felt  its  power  can  never  free  himself  from  the 
haunting  charm  of  the  Desert." 


The 

Lure 

of 

the 

Desert* 


The 

Rise 

and 

Fall 

of 

Hordin 

City 


THE  RISE  AND  FALL  OF  HARDIN  CITY, 

KITE  as  bleached  bones  and  level  as  a 
coffin  lid,  Quin  River  Desert  fills  the 
miles  and  miles  of  space  lying  between 
the  Antelope  and  Black  Rock  mountain 
ranges.  A  sea  of  alkali,  the  Desert  winds 
set  waves  of  drifting  sand  lapping  the 
western  shore,  where  Black  Rock  point  itself  (that 
famous  landmark  for  all  who  have  voyaged  here,  from 
Fremont  down  to  the  lonely  prospector  of  today),  juts 
promontory-wise  into  the  great  silence.  So  vast  and 
level  it  is,  that  Quin  River  itself —a  considerable  stream 
after  the  spring  thaw  has  sent  the  snow-fed  creeks  rush 
ing  down  the  river— is  but  a  varnish  of  moisture,  miles 
in  width,  on  the  surface  of  the  great  plain  where  sun 
and  wind  soon  combine  to  rub  it  all  away. 

A  sea  without  a  sail,  save  those  that— like  mine  own 
—have  gone  drifting  over  its  desolation  into  that  won 
derful  beyond;  that  weird  world  made  of  strange  rock 
forms  and  lavish  splendor  of  color  that  lies  a  hundred 
miles  away  from  the  railroad,  undisturbed  and  almost 
unknown.  A  land  of  marvels,  of  wonder  upon  wonder, 
where  you  may  ride  for  hours,  never  out  of  sight  of 
petrified  tree  stumps  that  stand  like  grim  ghosts  of  dead 
centuries;  where  you  may  ride  for  days  among  hills 
honey-combed  with  caves  whose  linings  are  beautiful 
frescoes  of  color,  or  freaks  in  their  oddity  of  form; 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


where  you  may  ride  for  weeks  among  springs— warm 
hot,  or  furiously  boiling— never  finding  one  that  run 
cold  water.  And  riding  so,  you  will  find  life  a  gooc 
thing.  That  is,  if  you  have  the  eyes  that  see  and  the 
heart  that  beats  in  brotherhood  to  vast  silence  and  space 
and  the  thousand  and  one  alluring  things  that  we  may 
find  anywhere  on  the  far  edges  of  civilization — anc 
surely  here,  where  the  world  is  rich  in  rare  surprises 
as  it  waits  you  under  the  wide-arching,  steel-brighl 
Nevada  sky. 

So  one  day  I  beached  my  boat  beyond  the  cliffs  and 
rippled  hills  that  cluster  about  the  point  of  Black  Rock ; 
beyond  those  terrors,  Double  Hot  Springs,  whose 
wickedly  boiling  waters  change  their  coloring — green 
as  copperas,  or  blue  as  indigo— according  as  the  light 
falls.  Walking  about  their  funnel-shaped  rims,  peer 
ing  down  into  that  inferno,  you  see  the  wheel-barrow 
that  since  the  early  '50  's  has  balanced  itself  twenty  feet 
under  water  on  the  edge  of  the  shelf  that  is  above  a 
depth  that  is  bottomless,  and  one  falls  to  wondering 
what  wayfarer  on  that  great  continental  Desert-road 
brought  it  from  out  the  far-away  East  to  leave  it  here ; 
and  why. 

Half  a  dozen  miles  beyond  Double  Hot  Springs, 
stands— tall  and  alone— a  chimney  of  squared,  whitish 
stone  blocks ;  sole  relic  of  the  buildings  that  once  made 
Hardin  City.  About  it  the  Desert  is  broken  into  hum 
mocks  of  hard  alkali  ground  that— being  opened— 
yields  the  only  fuel  of  the  place.  Hidden  there  are 
the  roots  of  giant  sagebrush  long  dead— roots  that  give 
no  sign  that  sagebrush  had  ever  thrived  there  till 
pick  and  shovel  uncover  them.  That  this  particular 
spot  was  chosen  for  the  townsite  of  Hardin  City,  was 
no  doubt  due  to  its  plentiful,  if  peculiar,  fuel  supply. 

Behind,  are  the  Harlequin  Hills— ribbed  ridges  of 


The 

Rise 

and 

Fail 

Of 

Hardin 

City 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


The 
Rise 
and 

Fall 
Of 

Hardin 
City 


color,  motley,  and  unreal  in  seeming.  And  here  it  was 
—just  where,  no  man  may  say— in  these  hills  that  the 
famous  Hardin  Silver  was  found,  and  lost — the  mar 
velous  Hardin  Silver  that  has  since  sent  many  a  man 
half  mad  in  his  always  fruitless  quest.  To  this  day 
there  are  those  of  great  faith  who  yearly  seek  the  myth 
ical  silver  in  those  mountains  of  strange  geological 
formations— so  unlike  any  of  their  neighbor  heights 
and  hills.  Many  are  the  men  who,  since  the  stir  it  made 
in  1849,  have  been  constantly  searching;  and  not  the 
least  well  known  among  them  have  been  Ladue  Vary 
and  Leroy  Arnold.  Feeble,  with  palsied  hands  and 
frost-white  hair,  these  two  men  stir  one's  pity  by  their 
useless  faith. 

It  was  years  after  the  Hardin  Silver  excitement  that 
there  journeyed  down  from  Idaho  a  miner  named 
Frank  Peed,  bringing  with  him  samples  of  ore  from 
the  famous  Poor  Man's  mine— bits  that  had  that  soapy 
appearance  peculiar  to  some  rock  from  that  district. 
These  pieces  he  showed  to  two  men,  O'Donnell  and 
Jennison,  who  at  once  declared  it  to  be  similar  to,  if 
not  identical  with,  ore  that  they  had  once  seen  near  Har 
din  Mountain ;  but  which  at  the  time  had  not  impressed 
them  as  being  valuable.  Taking  some  three  or  four 
pounds  of  samples  from  the  Poor  Man's  mine  for  com 
parison,  they  at  once  went  into  the  Black  Rock  country. 
Soon  they  returned  with  a  large  quantity  that  seemed 
of  the  same  character,  and  suggested  the  same  values. 
An  assay  made  by  the  assayer  of  the  American  Valley 
Smelter,  gave  a  return  of  $117.  Other  tests  under  the 
direction  of  such  men  as  Kingsbury,  Bowman,  and 
Major  Smith  of  the  fort  at  Smoke  Creek  gave  uniform 
results. 

Men  were  at  once  set  at  the  task  of  taking  out  a  large 
amount  of  ore;  and  work,  buoyed  by  hope,  went  for- 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


73 


ward  with  the  mining,  as  the  miner's  mirage  beckoned 
them  on.  An  assayer  of  good  repute  was  engaged  to 
work  exclusively  for  that  mine  at  a  monthly  stipend 
of  $250.  He  devoted  himself  to  the  work  with  a  whole- 
heartedness  most  commendable.  The  results  he  got 
from  his  assays  were  fabulous.  Also,  the  results  were 
unquestioned  by  the  mine  owners. 

Encouraged  by  the  assay  returns,  several  tons  of 
the  ore  were  selected  from  that  which  had  been  taken 
out,  for  a  working  test,  and  one  of  the  Thacker  brothers 
undertook  to  haul  it  to  Union ville,  nearly— if  not 
quite— a  hundred  miles  away.  It  was  worked  at  the 
John  C.  Fall  mill  at  the  mouth  of  Unionville  canon— 
the  mill  at  the  old  Arizona  mine  that  made  Fall  a  several 
times  millionaire,  known  all  over  the  West— but  Fall 
could  not,  for  some  inexplicable  reason,  cope  with  it. 
Nothing  was  obtained  from  the  rock;  and,  as  is  usual 
in  such  cases,  the  mill  received  the  full  measure  of  cen 
sure  and  blame. 

Disappointed,  but  not  disbelieving,  they  determined 
upon  another,  if  smaller,  working  test;  so  a  man  by 
the  name  of  Giddings,  with  a  thousand  pounds  or  so, 
trudged  with  it  into  the  Washoe  country — to  Ball's 
Mill.  When  the  millmen  there  (experienced  in  the  ap 
praising  of  ores  to  the  degree  of  being  able  almost  to 
recognize  values  at  sight)  saw  it,  they  at  once  declared 
the  stuff  to  be  worthless,  and  laughed  at  Giddings  for 
bringing  it  all  that  great  distance  to  be  milled  by  them. 

So,  in  pity  for  his  delusion,  they  refused  to  work  it. 
They  declared  it  would  be  robbery  on  their  part;  and 
on  his,  time  and  money  thrown  away. 

But  Giddings  was  obdurate.  He  had  faith  in  the 
rock;  and  he  wanted  it  worked.  And  what  faith  so 
absolute,  what  belief  so  obstinate,  as  that  of  a  man  with 
a  mine  he  believes  in !  At  last  the  man  who  had  charge 


The 

Rise 

and 

Fall 

of 

Hardin 

City 


74 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 
Rise 
and 

Fall 
Of 

Hardin 
City 


of  the  mill— Hiskey— more  to  quiet  Giddings  than  for 
any  other  reason,  said  they  would  take  it;  and  having 
an  entire  distrust  of  there  being  any  ore  values  what 
ever  in  the  lot,  agreed  to  make  no  charge  for  the  mill 
ing  should  the  result  show  any  such  values. 

The  rock  was  worked;  the  returns  were— great! 
Hiskey  proved  himself  a  man  of  his  word  and  made 
no  charge  for  the  milling. 

Then  the  original  owners  of  the  mine,  having  taken 
others  in  with  them  to  assist  with  capital  in  the  con 
struction  of  suitable  works,  began  the  erection  of  the 
mill  and  other  necessary  buildings.  That  was  the 
founding  of  "Hardin  City."  Satisfied  that  they  had 
"a  big  thing"  at  the  foot  of  Hardin  Mountain,  they 
felt  that  the  work  was  warranted.  Major  Bass,  Judge 
Harvey,  Larry  Bass,  Alvaro  Evans  and  Chancellor 
Derby,  as  well  as  many  others,  had  tests  made  time  and 
time  again,  with  the  same  uniform  result.  Perhaps 
eighty  tons,  as  working  tests,  were  milled  by  them— 
the  net  result  being  about  $4,000  handed  over  to  them 
in  silver  bullion.  The  more  the  tests,  the  greater  were 
the  returns.  On  an  average,  they  ran  higher  than  the 
average  workings  of  the  Comstock.  Also,  there  was 
a  greater  amount  of  gold  than  the  Comstock  carried. 
It  seemed  in  the  face  of  such  evidence  that  there  was 
no  good  reason  for  disbelieving  in  the  mine's  genuine 
worth,  and  so  the  fame  of  the  Desert's  mining  claim 
spread. 

Soon  a  cluster  of  substantial  adobe  buildings  were 
grouped  around  a  mill  modeled  on  precisely  the  style 
of  Dall's— the  one  that  had  so  successfully  worked 
their  second  ore  shipment.  To  reproduce  as  nearly  as 
possible  the  mill  they  knew  could,  and  did,  work  such 
ore  as  they  had,  was  the  thing  to  be  done  to  ensure 
them  unfailing  results;  so  they  secured  the  services  of 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


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the  furnace  man  from  Ball's,  together  with  two  other 
men  that  understood  perfectly  the  working  of  that 
mill  in  all  particulars.  With  every  hope  of  success  the 
owners  looked  anxiously  forward  to  the  clean-up  of 
their  first  run. 

In  the  meantime  a  new  assayer,  Cheatham,  had  been 
engaged.  The  man's  name  was  a  misnomer,  for  he  was 
honesty  itself;  and  with  the  result  of  his  first  assay 
before  them,  came  the  first  chill  of  fear,  lest  they  had 
been  over  sanguine.  The  results  obtained  by  Cheat- 
ham  were  not  at  all  those  got  by  his  predecessor.  The 
mine-owners  began  to  look  dubious,  outsiders  said 
things  looked  queer,  and  all  awaited  the  start  of  the 
mill  with  the  keenest  of  anxiety. 

At  last  everything  was  complete— the  ore  was  wait 
ing,  the  machinery  was  set  in  motion,  the  stamps  went 
to  chunk-chunk-chunking  the  ore  into  powder.  They 
were  now  to  know  the  truth. 

Several  tons  were  run  through.  The  result  was— 
nothing ! 

Absolutely  nothing !  Not  even  a  trace.  Of  metal  of 
any  sort,  none !  Not  so  small  a  particle  as  the  point  of 
a  fine  cambric  needle  did  it  yield. 

Over  and  over  again  they  tried.  Always,  the  result 
was  the  same.  The  rock  from  Hardin  Mountain  was 
barren  of  ore  values  as  a  bit  of  Bath  brick. 

What  was  the  explanation,  then,  of  the  bullion  they 
had  received  from  the  run  at  Ball's  Mill? 

I,  myself,  can  offer  no  explanation.  I  can  only  tell 
you  what  was  told  me.  An  old  miner— Buffy,  of  Beer 
Creek— whose  superstitions  would  put  to  the  blush 
many  a  Southern  mammy's  faith  in  spooks  and  spirits, 
has  solemnly  averred  to  me  that  the  mine  had  been 
placed  under  a  spell  by  some  evil  spirit— changed  by  a 


The 

Rise 

and 

Fall 

of 

Hardin 

City 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 

Rise 

and 

Fall 

of 

Hardin 

City 


genius  of  ill  from  rich  rock   into   worthless.     "  Hoo 
dooed,"  he  said. 

But  when  I  repeated  this  to  one  who  had,  in  days 
of  old,  known  the  men  and  the  mine,  he  only  smiled 
and  said  that  an  assayer  receiving  $250  per  month 
would  naturally  want  to  ''hold  onto  his  job,"  and 
(unconsciously,  of  course)  would  be  optimistic. 

"But  the  bullion  that  was  worked  at  Ball's  Mill?" 
I  queried. 

"Comstock." 

"I  don't  understand,"  I  said,  rather  bewildered. 

"They  hadn't  made  a  thorough  clean-up  of  Ball's 
Mill  after  running  those  rich  old  Virginia  ores  through, 
before  they  took  hold  of  this  ore,  and  these  fellows  got 
about  $4,000  in  bullion  that  originally  came  up  to  the 
light  of  day  from  out  of  Comstock  shafts." 

Its  buildings  are  quite  dismantled  and  destroyed. 
The  winds  of  the  Besert— the  rains  of  the  years  have 
nibbled  and  gnawed  at  the  adobes  until  only  the  faint 
est  traces  that  they  once  were,  remain.  Of  the  mill 
itself,  part  of  the  whitish-gray  stone  of  its  walls, 
and  most  of  the  tall  chimney,  stand  out  in  sharp  relief, 
discernable  miles  away  against  the  darker  background 
of  Hardin  Mountain. 

Buffy  told  me  the  other  day  that  now  the  mill  is 
haunted. 


THE  MEN  OF  THE  DESERT. 


N  THE  Pine  Forest  range,  tucked  away 
in  a  canon  that  is  hard  for  a  stranger  to 
find,  is  a  little  group  of  cabins  where 
some  of  the  oldest  prospectors  in  the 
State  have  made  their  homes  for  this 
many  a  year.  There,  away  from  kindred 
—even  civilization— they  have  lived  for  a  third  of  a 
century,  seeking  for  the  gold  they  have  never  found. 
They  have  isolated  themselves  from  the  rest  of  the 
world  for  half  a  lifetime,  and  have  lived  a  life  of  hardest 
toil  in  that  land  of  which  such  wondrous  stories  are  told 
of  mines  of  fabulous  worth.  It  savors  of  romance  to 
read  of  men  going  there  to  seek  their  fortunes;  but  to 
endure  the  hardships  such  quests  involve  is  quite  a 
different  matter. 

Apart  from  the  world,  and  by  the  world  long  forgot, 
these  men  are  in  reality  path-finders—blazing  the  way 
for  future  generations. 

So  the  quiet  years  go  by,  while  they  go  on  looking 
for  fairy-gold— for  the  mines  that  are  found  only  at 
the  rainbow's  end.  Yet,  fairy-gold  though  it  be,  still 
will  they  keep  on  seeking  the  Three  Little  Lakes  of 
Gold,  and  Forman's  Find,  and  the  silver  that  Hardin 
saw,  or  the  long  lost  Blue  Bucket  mines.  They  are  not 
miners,  after  all— only  prospectors ;  for  they  have  never 
had  a  mine.  They  have,  for  all  their  busy  years,  found 


The 

Men 

of 

the 

Desert* 


In   Miners'   Mirage-Land 


The 
Men 
of 

the 

Desert, 


nothing  to  be  mined.  So  they  are  but  prospectors,  at 
most.  Neither  are  they  looking  for  mines.  Only  for 
a  mine.  Just  one  certain  mine,  that  each  one  believes 
in— and  each  one  has  named  as  his.  Only  It  is  in  dream 
land  still. 

Some  of  these  men  have  met  starvation  and  thirst 
in  the  Desert,  and  have  been  down  to  the  edge  of 
things  where  Death  claims  his  own— and  have  yet 
lived,  coming  back  from  the  horror  of  it  all,  to  tell  of 
the  hours  of  the  Black  Night,  and  to  warn  other  men 
from  the  trail  that  leads  that  way.  Some  there  are 
who  have  gone  through  battles  of  Indian  warfare;  and 
they  will  show  you  arrow-point  scars,  and  those  that 
came  from  slits  in  the  flesh  that  were  made  by  the 
' '  Redskins. ' '  That  was  when  the  State  was  a  Territory ; 
and  they  themselves  were  young.  These  men  all  have 
their  stories  to  tell;  and  if  you  linger  long  In  the  land, 
you  will  find  yourself  often  by  their  campfires,  as  the 
darkness  falls  on  the  foothills  and  they  whittle  from  a 
square  of  tobacco  that  with  which  they  crowd  the  bowls 
of  their  pipes.  When  a  glowing  greasewood  coal  is 
laid  there,  and  the  pipe  is  made  to  draw,  you  will 
hearken  to  things  (as  they  tell  them)  worth  crossing 
the  world  to  hear. 

But  other  men  than  miners  live  in  this  lava-land; 
and  here  have  made  homes.  So  small  are  the  ranches, 
you  scarcely  call  them  by  that  name.  You  come  upon 
them  up  on  the  heights  where  are  found  wee  meadows 
wet  by  the  mountains'  melted  snow,  or  the  flow  that 
comes  down  from  hot  springs.  There  men  toil,  and  till 
the  ground,  and  find  life  good.  There  one  fills  his 
lungs  with  air  that  is  like  wine  in  the  blood,  and  his 
soul  with  the  gladness  of  living.  You  will  have  to  dis 
cover  these  places  for  yourself;  for  the  roads  that  men 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


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make  in  that  country  mostly  run  through  the  valleys, 
and  these  skyland  ranches  do  not  lie  on  your  route. 

As  you  go  journeying  away  over  these  little  used 
highways,  you  note  that  the  country  can  be  in  no 
wise  changed  from  that  which  men  found  as  they  voy 
aged  through  here  in  the  years  of  long  ago. 

Railroad  steel  has  been  laid,  and  the  wires  have  been 
strung  on  poles  set  away  to  the  North,  and  far,  far  to 
the  Southward;  but  here  there  is  nothing  to  mark  hu 
man  life  in  the  land,  except  the  dim  and  dusty  road 
that  is  but  little  more  than  a  thread  through  the  val 
ley's  expanse. 

Desert  stretches  reach  to  far  mountains.  Be 
yond  are  still  other  barren  plains;  beyond  these  yet 
other  lonely  mountain  ranges.  And  these  keep  re 
peating  themselves  over  and  over  again  as  you  go— 
as  you  travel  farther  and  farther  away  to  the  North. 

A  picture  of  vastness.  And— as  you  view  it  from 
afar— one  with  no  detail;  only  the  great  sky-touching 
mountain  ranges,  the  wide  Desert— and  over  them  the 
immensity  of  the  ocean-blue  of  the  heavens,  lending 
the  picture  its  only  vivid  coloring.  But  go  up  into 
the  mountains,  and  there  you  find  a  wealth  of  tint  and 
tone.  Go  up  into  the  mountains,  and  you  will  there 
find  the  men  that  are  good  to  know— the  prospectors 
who  came  into  the  country  in  the  days  of  their  youth. 


The 

Men 

of 

the 

Desert* 


Three 

Little 

Lakes 

of 

Gold 


THREE  LITTLE  LAKES  OF  GOLD. 

SEP-DOMED  heavens— a  wide-reaching 
Desert.  Above,  the  sapphire  blue  of  a 
summer  sky  without  one  cloud— below 
the  nun-grey  of  a  Nevada  plain  without  a 
vestige  of  verdure.  And  (at  the  rim 
where  they  meet  and  blend)  distant 
mountains,  dim  and  uncertain  in  outline  and  coloring. 

Here  you  are  far,  far  beyond  the  locomotive's  whistle 
or  the  moaning  of  the  railroad  telegraph  wires,  with 
the  plaintive  chords  drawn  from  them  by  the  plain's 
winds.  You  travel  farther  still  into  the  North,  across 
those  level,  lonely  sand-wastes,  going  toward  vague 
mountains  wrapped  in  violet  and  blue  shroudings,  and 
so  bring  them  out  of  their  uncertainty,  until  you  reach 
the  first  waves  of  foothills  that  lap  their  feet;  then 
the  mountains'  misty  outlines  are  dissipated,  and  they 
stand  in  all  their  mightiness  before  you— ruggedly  mag 
nificent  and  quite  unlike  anything  you  imagined  them 
to  be.  For  you  find  there  hidden  canons  holding 
groves  of  leafy  shade,  and  beautiful  streams,  delicious- 
ly  cold  on  the  hottest  of  summer  days. 

Cross  the  mountain  chain,  and  there  will  be  another 
Desert  like  unto  this  you  have  but  just  passed  over. 
Then  (as  breastworks  on  its  farther  side)  there  are 
other  mountains  so  like  these  that  you  grow  bewildered 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


8r 


in  looking.  Another  wide  plain,  dry  and  deathly  still; 
another  great  ridge,  vague  and  uncertain. 

Half  a  century  ago— in  1851— a  little  party  of  emi 
grants,  with  faces  turned  toward  the  West,  moved 
slowly  along  here  in  their  ox-teams,  and  one  night 
camped  at  what  is  now  known  as  Massacre  Springs.  It 
was  away  up  toward  the  northward  of  the  traveled 
ways  across  the  continent— in  the  "High  Rock  coun 
try  "—on  the  emigrant  road  that  crosses  the  upper  part 
of  Humboldt  county.  On  awakening  the  following 
morning,  they  found  that  Indians  creeping  to  their 
camp  while  they  slept,  and  leaving  them  undisturbed, 
had  stolen  all  their  cattle.  What  to  do?  How  to  reach 
California?  Their  oxen  were  gone.  Without  draft 
animals,  to  press  on  to  the  West  was  an  impossibility. 
There  was  nothing  to  do  but  to  follow  the  trail  of  the 
stolen  steers,  and— relying  on  the  white  man's  superior 
weapons— recover  their  stock,  if  possible. 

So  all  the  men  of  the  party— five  in  number— set 
out,  leaving  behind  them  the  womenfolk  and  little 
children.  The  cattle  were  easily  tracked,  for  during  the 
night  a  light  rain  had  fallen,  and  their  footprints,  as 
well  as  those  of  the  Indians,  were  sharp  cut  in  the  mud. 

The  day  was  dark  and  gloomy;  clouds  obscured  the 
sun,  and  a  fog  settled  over  the  whole  valley.  At  times 
a  drizzling  rain  fell;  but  the  men  tramped  doggedly 
on,  following  the  hoof -prints  marked  deep  in  the  moist 
earth.  After  many  hours  of  walking,  they  realized 
that  they  were  further  away  from  camp  than  was  pru 
dent  for  white  men  in  a  hostile  Indian  country;  inas 
much  as  the  women  and  children  were  entirely  unpro 
tected  during  the  time  they  might  be  away.  They 
halted,  and  conferred  together.  It  was  decided  that 
two  of  them  should,  at  once,  return  to  camp,  while  the 
remaining  three  were  to  follow  the  trail  of  the  stolen 


Three 

Little 

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of 

Gold 


83 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


Three 

Little 

Lakes 

of 

Cold 


cattle  until  they  were  sighted ;  and  then,  watching  their 
opportunity,  if  possible  get  possession  of  the  oxen  again 
and  get  them  back  to  camp.  Without  recovering  them 
the  emigrants  were  helpless  in  a  hostile  country,  un 
less  they  should  chance  to  be  picked  up  by  some  other 
party  of  passing  emigrants— a  contingency  so  remote 
as  to  be  scarcely  worth  considering. 

So  they  parted;  two  of  them  going  back  to  camp, 
and  the  others  to  whose  lot  it  fell  to  follow  the  stolen 
cattle,  keeping  on  the  plainly  marked  trail  leading 
southward.  Finally,  these  three  found  themselves  in  a 
beautiful  and  well-watered  canon,  green  with  grass 
and  shrubbery.  The  rocky  cliffs  that  closed  it  in  rose 
to  great  heights  on  either  side;  and  down  between  the 
narrow  gorge's  walls  plunged  a  creek  in  a  succession 
of  foaming  cascades.  Near  the  entrance  of  the  canon 
it  leaped — a  sheer  drop  of  seventy-five  feet — over  a 
ledge  of  projecting  rock  in  a  beautiful  waterfall  to 
a  hollowed  place  in  the  solid  rock  bed  of  the  creek  be 
neath.  Then,  separating  into  three  streams,  the  waters 
formed  as  many  pools  below. 

It  was  at  the  foot  of  the  waterfall  the  three  men 
stopped,  and  stooped  to  the  basin  hollowed  there  near 
est  the  fall  to  drink.  In  its  clear  depths,  among  water- 
worn  pebbles  and  black  sand,  one  of  the  men  (who  had 
previously  seen  something  of  the  California  placers) 
saw  pieces  of  gold— not  simply  gold-dust,  but  nuggets. 
Huge  nuggets  of  the  pure  metal.  He  showed  them  to 
his  companions,  to  whom  native  gold  was  an  unfamiliar 
sight.  All  three  immediately  fell  a-searching  for  more, 
and  were  rewarded  in  a  short  time  by  finding  enough 
to  fill  a  tin  quart-cup  which  one  wore  tied  to  his  belt. 
Besides  this,  they  filled  their  pockets— and  one  of  the 
men  put  as  many  nuggets  into  his  handkerchief  as  he 
could  well  manage. 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


However,  they  feared  the  delay  of  hunting  for  gold 
might  lose  them  their  stock— which  was  infinitely  more 
precious  to  them  in  their  desperate  condition  than  a 
mountain  of  gold— so  realizing  that  each  minute  meant 
loss,  as  well  as  danger,  to  them,  they  reluctantly  pre 
pared  to  leave  the  spot  that  still  lured  them  to  stay. 
But  men  do  not  easily  turn  away  from  the  sight  of  gold, 
no  matter  to  whom  it  belongs;  and  this — uncounted 
wealth  for  all— was  all  their  own.  Theirs,  for  the 
simple  task  of  taking.  So,  after  filling  the  cup  with 
the  precious  nuggets,  and  cacheing  it  at  the  foot  of  a 
tree  (a  dead  pine  that  should  serve  as  guide  when  they 
would  come  again)  they  yielded  to  the  fascination  of 
the  gold's  yellow  shine,  and  turned  again  to  the  creek 
to  gather,  if  possible,  from  one  of  the  other  wee  lakes 
that  had  been  less  thoroughly  searched,  yet  other  bits 
of  gold.  They  had  scarcely  clambered  down  the  bank 
to  the  edge  of  the  stream  when  a  rain  of  lead  came  from 
the  cliffs  above  them,  and  two  of  the  three  men  fell— 
,  shot  to  death. 

Indians  had  slipped  softly  upon  them  as  they  were 
searching  in  the  gravel  and  sands;  and  the  waterfall's 
roar  had  drowned  any  sound  that  otherwise  might  have 
warned  them.  Before  the  second  volley  of  shots  could 
come  from  those  old-time,  slow-loading  guns,  the  re 
maining  man  had  found  opportunity  to  escape  by  dart 
ing  quickly  into  the  thick  underbrush,  and  working  his 
way  carefully  up  the  creek.  Clever  as  the  redskins 
were  in  following  the  trail  of  a  white  man,  here  was  one 
who  outwitted  them  by  hiding  among  rocks  that, 
in  their  search,  they  passed  and  repassed  many  times. 
Then  slipping  out,  but  keeping  well  under  cover,  he 
finally  found  himself  in  a  large  grove  of  aspens  and 
cottonwoods.  From  there  he  made  his  way  out  of  the 
canon  to  the  heights  where  he  could  see  over  the  coun- 


Three 

Little 

Lakes 

of 

Gold 


In  Miners9  Mirage  Land 


Three 

Little 

Lakes 

of 

Gold 


try.  Mountains,  mostly  rugged  and  bare,  were  all 
about  him,  rimming  the  wide  and  barren  plains;  but 
far  away  to  the  southward  he  discovered  a  single  tim 
bered  range.  Toward  it  he  directed  his  course.  He 
had  lost  his  bearings  in  his  flight,  and  could  not  guess 
now  in  which  direction  lay  the  camp.  He  argued,  too, 
that  no  doubt  hours  before  the  redskins  had  come  down 
upon  him  and  his  companions,  they  had  found  the  un 
protected  women  and  children  and  massacred  them. 
Nothing  ever  was  heard  of  them,  or  of  the  two  men  who 
had  returned  to  camp,  so  that  they  too  doubtless  met 
their  death  at  the  hands  of  the  savages,  unless  they  per 
ished  in  the  Desert  in  an  attempt  to  continue  their 
journey  on  foot. 

When  the  one  survivor,  of  whom  we  know  aught,  saw 
the  wooded  mountain  across  the  valley,  he  turned  his 
steps  that  way.  He  must  get  out  of  the  Indian-infested 
country  as  best  he  could,  without  food  or  any  human 
assistance.  Ahead  of  him  were  terrible  miles  to  be 
traversed,  and  the  demon  of  thirst  to  be  battled  with. 
Where  trees  were,  there  he  knew  was  water ;  and  about 
those  mountain  springs  was  greater  chance  of  finding 
things  that  were  edible.  He  must  reach  the  tree  cov 
ered  heights. 

He— Stoddard— began  his  awful  journey.  He  still 
carried  the  handkerchief  with  its  burden  of  gold,  having 
kept  an  unconscious  grasp  on  it  through  all  the  perils 
of  his  escape.  Over  mountain  ridges  he  climbed,  over 
sun-baked  plains  he  wearily  walked.  Days  and 
days  he  journeyed.  How  many?  where?  in  what  meas 
ure  of  suffering?— neither  he  nor  any  other  ever  knew. 
For  when,  at  length,  he  wandered  into  Downieville,  in 
California,  it  was  a  shrivelled  mummy  that  men  saw 
stumbling  along  in  shreds  of  ragged  clothing,  barefoot 
and  bareheaded,  half-famished  and  with  mind  wholly 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


gone.  Delirious,  he  babbled  of  Indians,  of  eating  roots 
and  the  berries  of  wild  rose-bushes,  of  picking  up  nug 
gets  of  gold,  of  walking— walking— walking !  He  had 
a  wild  animal's  fear  of  human  faces— was  hardly  human 
himself.  But  still  his  bony  fingers  clutched  a  handker 
chief,  and  in  the  handkerchief  were  the  nuggets  of  gold. 

Of  those  who  first  saw  Stoddard  when  he  staggered 
into  Downieville,  was  old  Major  Downie  himself— he 
for  whom  the  town  was  named.  To  many  a  listener  after 
wards  he  related  how  he  himself  had  seen  Stoddard 
still  tightly  gripping  the  handkerchief  as  he  came  into 
the  town — delirious,  in  the  likeness  of  a  skeleton,  yet 
with  the  miser's  grasp  on  his  treasure. 

When  after  long  weeks  of  careful  nursing,  reason 
returned  to  him,  he  began— little  by  little— to  recall 
the  events  of  days  directly  preceding  that  of  his  arrival 
at  the  canon  of  the  "three  little  lakes,"  as  he  called  the 
pools  where  the  gold  was  found.  Some  things  rose 
quite  clearly  before  his  mind;  others  he  groped  for 
through  a  fog  of  dimmed  recollection.  Gradually  he 
came  to  remember  that  about  noon  of  the  day  preced 
ing  the  one  when  his  companions  had  been  killed,  they 
had  passed  out  of  High  Rock  canon,  and  that  night  had 
camped  at  Massacre  Springs.  Then,  later,  memory  was 
further  cleared  of  the  haze,  and  he  told  of  the  loss  of 
the  cattle,  of  the  trail  they  had  followed,  of  the  finding 
of  the  nuggets,  of  the  Indians'  attack  upon  them,  of  his 
comrades'  fall,  and  his  own  escape,  and— lastly— of 
directing  his  course  toward  the  far-away  mountain  of 
water  and  food  as  well  as  shelter— that  mountain  to  the 
southward,  fully  forty  miles  away. 

Again  memory  failed  him.  As  to  the  fearful  days 
that  lay  between  the  time  when  he  dragged  his  wearied 
feet  over  the  dry  Desert  levels— going  mad  with  an 
intolerable  thirst,  and,  with  blood-shot  eyes,  always 


Three 

Little 

Lakes 

of 

Gold 


86 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Three 

Little 

Lakes 

of 

Gold 


looking  toward  the  far-off  heights  dark  with  juniper 
and  mountain  mahogany — and  the  time  when  he 
found  himself  fed  and  clothed  and  cared  for  by  the 
people  of  Downieville,  his  mind  was  a  complete  blank. 

As  to  the  truth  of  his  assertions  regarding  the  three 
little  lakes  of  gold — if  you  doubted,  there  was  the  hand 
kerchief  heavy  with  the  metal;  a  ve.ry  tangible  proof 
that  somewhere  back  in  Northern  Nevada  at  the  foot 
of  a  high  waterfall  in  a  lovely  canon,  where  three  small 
pools  and  in  them  was  gold. 

Then  the  gold  hunt  began.  That  was  in  the  spring 
of  '52 ;  and  not  yet  is  the  search  ended— not  yet  are  the 
searchers  done.  Still  men  go  to  the  big,  quiet  country 
away  off  there  where  the  railroad,  and  the  telegraph, 
and  the  daily  mail  do  not  find  them.  They  search,  and 
search,  and  search.  Even  in  this  year  of  grace  do  men 
go  to  seek  the  hidden  treasure  casket  of  the  mountain. 

Travelling  away  out  there,  on  pleasure  bent,  I  have 
myself  met  them  on  the  road;  and  (after  the  fashion  of 
wayfarers  in  a  great  silent  country  where  few  go,  albeit 
they  who  meet  are  strangers)  we  have  greeted  one 
another  as  we  met  on  the  road,  and  we  drew  rein  to  talk 
together  a  bit  there  in  the  stillness  of  the  wide  alkali 
plains.  I  have  found  them  bright  with  hope,  and  buoyed 
by  the  belief  that  they  surely,  this  time,  would  find 
reward  for  their  years  of  patient  search.  And  I  have 
seen  them  again,  long  afterward,  jaded  and  worn  with 
weeks  of  fatiguing  toilsome  travel.  Less  buoyant  they 
were,  less  bright ;  but  still  hopeful  that  some  day  they 
would  come  upon  the  canon  (that  lies  less  than  a  day's 
foot- travel  from  Massacre  Springs)  where  a  mountain 
stream  falls  sheer  to  its  rocky  bed  below;  and  the 
stream— dividing— fills  three  tiny  pools,  and  in  the  pools 
are  nuggets  of  gold. 

They  search  and  seek— they  grow  old  and  gray  in 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


the  seeking,  while  the  years  slip  softly  by,  as  a  gray 
coyote  slips  by  one  on  the  rabbit-trails  that  make  a 
network  of  the  gray  earth  there.  Searching  for  what 
(we  say)  is  not.  Creeks  they  find  in  the  canons,  that 
have  divided  and  make  three— four— a  dozen  little 
pools.  But  no  waterfall  plunges  down  the  gorge  from 
just  above.  The  mountains  have  many  beautiful  water 
falls  (if  one  but  knows  where  to  find  them),  but  none 
that  the  old  men  have  found  sings  to  three  little  lakes 
down  below.  The  sceptics  (after  their  fashion)  smile, 
but  that  does  not  hinder  the  faithful  in  their  quest. 

Dreamers?  We  declare  them  such.  Yet  suppose 
that  some  time  one  of  their  number  should  find  the  spot 
that  Stoddard  found  back  in  the  early  'fifties?  What 
if  one  of  the  faithful  should  some  day  come  back  to  tell 
us  he  has  found,  in  a  remote  canon  away  back  on  the 
plains,  an  old  tin  cup  (so  old  and  rusted  that  it  broke 
apart  as  he  lifted  it),  and  that  the  cup  was  filled  full 
to  the  brim  with  virgin  gold?  What  then? 


Three 

Little 

Lakes 

of 

Gold 


THE  BEAUTY  OF  THE  DESERT. 


The 

Beauty 

of 

the 

Desert* 


NDER  the  palms  and  pepper-trees  that 
grow  by  Pacific  waters  I  sit,  and  say: 
"This  is  home";  saying  it  over  and  over 
again,  as  a  child  repeats  the  lesson  that 
is  hard  to  learn.  But  repeating  the  words 
of  a  lesson  a  hundred  and  more  times  is 
not  learning  it.  And  I  do  not  know  my  lesson  yet.  I 
have  driven  my  tent  pegs  here  among  California  roses, 
and  under  a  California  sky.  I  have  stretched  the  ropes 
tight,  and  have  anchored  them  down— to  stay.  Yet 
this  is  not  Home.  If  you  would  ask  why,  remember 
that  the  tent  canvas  was  weathered  in  a  Desert-wind, 
and  the  ropes  bleached  by  a  Desert-sun.  Then,  too,  the 
tent  stood  there  for  long.  Very  long.  And  the  tent  pegs 
pull  hard  when  driven  long  in  one  place.  So— though 
there  are  roses  and  lilies  about  me,  and  the  wind  brings 
the  salt  smell  of  the  sea— yet  would  I  have  the  Desert- 
alkali  in  my  nostrils  and  smell  the  smoke  from  a  grease- 
wood  camp-fire.  You,  who  do  not  understand  why  I 
make  such  choice,  are  apt  to  ask:  "Is  it  not  a  mirage 
you  see— the  charm  of  color,  and  form,  and  music  that 
you  say  is  in  the  Desert?  We  do  not  see  these  things. 
We  only  see  uncouth  fashioning,  where  you  see  magnifi 
cence  or  grace.  The  cry  of  a  cougar— the  coyote's 
wailing  is  uncanny  to  hear;  yet  you  call  it  music.  You 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


tell  us  there  is  color  in  the  Desert;  while  we,  who  know, 
see  nothing  but  the  endless  gray— gray  always  and 
always.  We  are  wise  with  the  wisdom  of  cities  and 
many  men,  and  therefore  we  know.  It  is  but  a  mirage, 
this  charm  of  the  Desert." 

And  so  you  wise  ones  decide  for  the  ones  whom  you 
call  poor  fools,  and  say  that  the  mirage  they  follow  is 
like  unto  the  one  the  wanderer  a-thirst  sees,  or  the  old 
miner  in  his  quest  for  rainbow-gold. 

Well,  is  happiness,  or  beauty,  or  any  of  the  things 
that  give  us  joy  anything  more  than  a  mirage?  Do  they 
exist  except  as  we  see  them?  And  is  it  not  well  that 
we  are  thus  unwise  to  believe  in  the  non-existent?  For 
when  we  shall  have  come  to  the  door  of  death,  and  all 
of  life  is  ended,  we  shall  come  to  know  that  through  all 
the  years  that  have  been  ours,  the  heart  was  made  glad 
by  our  faiths  more  often  than  by  facts.  So  let  me  be 
lieve  in  the  Desert  still.  We  find  in  the  world  only 
what  we,  ourselves,  bring  into  it.  If  we  find  love,  and 
joy,  and  beauty,  it  is  because  we  are  capable  of  loving, 
and  can  feel  joy,  and  can  see  beauty.  They  are  not 
there,  except  as  they  are  of  us. 

So,  now,  go  your  way  and  leave  me  and  the  old  miners 
to  our  faiths— our  fancies,  if  you  will.  At  least,  we 
have  had  much  that  you  have  missed. 

Perhaps  it  is  because  of  all  this  that  I  feel  kinship 
with  those  who  believe  in  the  wonder-tales. 

After  you  have  come  to  know  these  men  and  their 
stories,  and  have  lived  long  enough  in  the  land  they 
have  made  their  own  to  understand  why  it  is  they  can 
not  go  away,  you  will  have  a  tender  regard  for  them  and 
their  welfare,  no  matter  where  your  lot  may  be  cast  in 
all  the  after  years.  You  will  never  forget  ever  so  small 
a  part  of  any  of  the  stories  that  they  have  told  you. 


The 
Beauty 
of 
the 

Desert 


9o 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


The 

Beauty 

of 

the 

Desert 


The  seasons  will  come  and  go,  you  will  make  new 
friends  and  bury  the  old,  and  life  will  bring  you  fresh 
interests  and  let  slip  the  things  that  you  knew  on  other 
by-ways ;  but  of  these  old  men  and  their  complete  trust, 
there  shall  never  come  to  you  a  forgetting.  To  the  last 
chapter  of  your  life,  the  memory  of  their  own— and  their 
stories — will  be  with  you,  to  link  you  yet  closer  to  the 
old  days  when  you  found  the  Desert  and  its  men. 


THE  LOST  BLUE  BUCKET  MINES. 

0  STATE  in  the  Union  contains  so  great 
a  variety  of  minerals  and  geological  phe 
nomena  as  Nevada.  Not  a  county  of  the 
State  is  so  rich  in  them  as  is  Humboldt. 
And  one  may  add  that  perhaps  no  other 
like  area  on  the  face  of  the  globe  so 
abounds  in  legends  of  "lost  mines"— of  fascinating  tales 
of  fabulous  "finds"  of  every  valuable  mineral  or  preci 
ous  stone  that  Mother  Earth  has  ever  given  birth  to— as 
that  same  county  lying  in  the  northeastern  corner  of 
the  State.  Go  out  there  among  the  old  prospectors  for 
a  month  or  more,  and  you  will  hear  scores  upon  scores 
of  stories  of  the  marvelous  findings  of  diamonds  and 
rubies,  of  emeralds  and  turquoise,  of  copper  and  lead, 
of  silver  and  gold.  But  mostly  of  gold.  For  the  dream 
of  the  old-time  prospector  is  always  of  finding  gold 
in  quantity  so  great  that  one  would  grow  bewildered 
in  its  computation. 

Simple  hearted  and  credulous,  there  are  dozens  of 
them  today  looking  for  mines  that  have  never  ex 
isted,  save  in  the  lurid  imagination  of  some  legend- 
maker—some  emigrant  who  crossed  the  plains  in  the 
late  'forties  or  early  'fifties,  and  at  the  end  of  his  jour 
ney  told  eager  listeners  of  his  "find"  away  back, 
somewhere,  in  the  barren-land.  How  many  trusting 
ones  among  the  listeners  found  death  in  the  Desert 


The 

Lost 

Blue 

Bucket 

Mines 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 

Lost 

Blue 

Bucket 

Mines 


through  the  lure  of  these  legends,  God  only  knows! 
But  the  unmarked  graves  that  resulted  are  more  than 
you  would  guess  there  could  be— graves  carelessly  or 
wantonly  dug  by  way  of  the  wild  tales  told  by  men 
who  (just  to  be  the  envied  centre  of  a  crowd  of  open- 
mouthed  listeners)  fabricated  them  for  their  own 
amusement.  Such  falsehoods  led  many  a  one  away 
to  bear  the  hardships  and  privations  of  years  of  Desert 
roving;  perhaps  to  die  at  last  in  the  lonely  land,  and 
to  die  there  alone.  Have  you  ever  thought  what  it 
would  be  like,  for  a  man  to  die  in  the  Desert— perhaps 
a  hundred  miles  from  any  other  human  being— alone 
under  the  staring  sky,  with  no  sight  of  moving  things 
but  the  gray  lizards  and  the  little  brown  squirrels,  and 
a  lone  coyote  watching  him  from  some  rise  a  few  yards 
away;  with  no  sound  but  the  coyote's  wailing  cry,  and 
the  moaning  of  the  Desert  wind.  So  many,  many  men 
have  died  in  just  this  way;  only  we  are  apt  to  forget 
that  it  is  ever  so. 

Over  there  in  that  half -explored,  wholly  interesting 
country,  where  the  chief  chain  of  mountains  lias  been 
fashioned  by  the  united  work  of  the  great  lava  flow 
and  the  erosion  of  the  centuries  into  flattened  tops, 
making  a  vast  landscape  of  sky-touching  tablelands— 
where  the  cliffs  and  chasms  take  on  strange  shapes  and 
colorings — where  the  odd  and  unusual  in  mountain  and 
plain  is  about  you  always  and  everywhere,  there  lies, 
still  unfound  by  the  prospectors,  a  canon  that  these 
aged  and  earnest  men  will  tell  you  is  rich  in  nuggets 
of  gold— the  canon  of  the  "Blue  Bucket"  diggings. 

In  1845  one  of  the  earliest  trains  of  emigrants  cross 
ing  the  plains,  with  Oregon  for  an  objective  point,  was 
working  its  way  down  the  banks  of  the  Humboldt,  and 
at  Gravelly  Ford— a  noted  point  on  the  old  road,  where 
now  is  the  station  of  Beowawe— separated  into  two 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


93 


parties;  one  continuing  on  down  the  Humboldt  river, 
while  the  other  took  the  road  by  the  way  of  Black 
Rock  into  California.  The  latter  party  on  reaching 
the  Pacific  Coast  had  startling  stories  to  tell  of  their 
adventures  upon  the  way,  while  going  through  that 
country  that  lies  back  from  that  river  which  in  the 
early  days  was  known  as  " Mary's  River,"  instead  of 
"Humboldt." 

And  this  is  what  they  told: 

After  leaving  Black  Rock— perhaps  three  or  four 
days'  travel  beyond  that  grim,  dark-hued  promontory— 
they  had  passed  through  a  canon  so  deep  and  rough 
that  "it  seemed  only  a  bird  would  be  able  to  get  out, 
once  it  found  itself  in  a  canon."  However,  after  suc 
cessfully  overcoming  a  deluge  of  difficulties  that  beset 
them,  they  finally  made  their  way  through.  Yet,  even 
so,  in  many  places  they  had  to  take  their  wagons  apart, 
and— piece  by  piece— hoist  them  up  cliffs  and  down 
declivities  by  means  of  ropes.  It  was  a  fearful  experi 
ence  of  trial  and  hardship,  unusual  even  in  Desert  travel 
of  the  early  times. 

It  was  when  directing  their  course  toward  the  "Twin 
Sister"  peaks  of  Oregon,  though  while  yet  in  Nevada, 
that  they  had  come  upon  this  canon,  to  them  unknown 
and  unnamed,  even  in  any  description  given  by  other 
wayfarers  who  later  came  through  the  land.  Neither 
had  they  any  knowledge  of  it  from  other  emigrants  who 
had  gone  before.  It  seemed  to  be  a  side  road,  little 
used,  and  turning  out  from  the  one  better  known  and 
more  traveled.  There,  while  the  wagons  were  grinding 
their  way  over  boulders  and  broken  rock  of  all  sorts 
and  sizes,  they  found,  in  the  shallow  creek  and  in  the 
ruts  made  by  the  wagon-wheels,  what  in  their  ignor 
ance  and  inexperience  they  called  "brass."  They  had 
heard  of  gold  dust,  of  course;  but  this  was  not  dust. 


The 

Lost 

Blue 

Bucket 

Mines 


94 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


The 

Lost 

Blue 

Bucket 

Mines 


It  must  then  be  brass.  But  it  was  pretty,  this  "brass" ; 
and  it  attracted  the  attention  in  particular  of  the  women 
and  children,  who  were  mainly  the  ones  to  gather 
it.  The  men  were  too  much  interested  in  the  matter 
of  getting  their  party  through  this  difficult  pass  to  pay 
heed  to  pretty  playthings  found  along  the  way. 

The  wagons,  and  the  buckets  hanging  to  their  sides, 
were  painted  a  vivid  blue.  And  into  the  buckets  were 
thrown  the  supposedly  worthless  nuggets.  When  cross 
ing  the  Deschutes  river  the  wagons  were  partially  cap 
sized,  and  many  of  the  emigrants'  belongings  lost. 
Among  such  things  as  went  to  the  bottom  of  the  Des 
chutes  were  the  buckets  that  carried  the  bright  bits 
of  metal.  A  very  few  pieces,  however,  had  been  cast 
into  the  wagons  with  other  things,  and  were  thus  saved. 
These,  with  Jheir  other  possessions,  the  emigrants  car 
ried  into  the  country  of  their  new  homes— eastern  Ore 
gon,  where  many  of  them  permanently  remained.  Some 
of  them,  though,  later,  went  southward,  and  eventually 
-—in  1848— found  themselves  at  gutter's  Fort.  They 
remained  there  during  the  first  months  of  that  year, 
and  there  they  were  shown  gold  dust  and  small  nug 
gets.  In  them  they  recognized  a  metal  that  they  had 
previously  supposed  to  be  "brass." 

Doubtful  if  any  of  their  old  companions  had  kept 
the  bits  of  yellow  metal  they  had  brought  to  the!  far 
ther  West  with  them,  they  nevertheless  wrote,  making 
inquiry.  As  soon  as  a  letter  could  reach  them,  there 
came  not  only  a  reply,  but  bits  of  gold— nuggets  from 
the  place  that  was  henceforth  to  be  known  as  the  "Blue 
Bucket  district"— that  had  been  preserved  through  the 
many  past  months  by  the  children  of  the  party  who 
had  kept  them  for  playthings. 

Comparison  with  the  nuggets  then  being  shown  at 
Sutter  Creek  proved  these  playthings  to  be  gold.  Of 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


95 


a  coarse  sort,  but  without  doubt  gold.  A  party  of  ninety 
was  organized  and  equipped  for  the  journey,  and  at 
once  started  back,  in  spite  of  the  warnings  of  friends 
that  Indians  were  up  in  arms  against  the  whites,  and 
that  traveling  had  become  even  more  perilous  than  be 
fore.  Regardless  of  the  almost  certain  encounters  with 
Indians,  they  set  out.  Of  the  ninety  who  left,  full  of 
courage  and  hope,  not  half  lived  to  reach  home. 
Long  before  they  came  to  the  country  of  the  "Blue 
Bucket"  diggings,  Indians  fell  upon  them,  and  only 
by  a  miracle  did  any  of  their  number  escape.  Of  the 
few  who  did  reach  California  and  Oregon  again,  only 
two  of  them  were  of  the  original  party  that  knew  the 
exact  locality  of  the  canon  of  the  "Blue  Bucket"  gold. 
With  Indians  on  the  warpath  they  were  too  disheart 
ened  to  continue  the  search  after  their  companions  had 
been  massacred ;  so  that— wounded  and  sick— they  went 
back  to  the  coast.  They  were  too  discouraged  with  the 
result  of  their  one  trip  to  ever  make  an  attempt  at  a 
second  journey  into  greasewood-land  and  the  home  of 
the  jack-rabbit.  The  Indians  were  there;  let  them 
have  it. 

But  to  Dr.  Dane,  as  they  lay  sick  at  Yreka,  they 
showed  the  nuggets  they  still  retained,  and  to  him  they 
told  the  story  of  the  emigrants'  "find."  They  de 
scribed  the  locality  of  the  canon,  and  gave  him  minute 
directions  as  to  where  one  should  go  to  find  it.  These 
men  died,  and  for  some  time  interest  in  the  "Blue 
Bucket"  gold  lapsed.  But  years  later,  while  engaged 
in  placer  mining,  the  Doctor  heard  that  which  quick 
ened  his  interest.  He  had  a  small  store  at  the  place  on 
the  river  where  he  was  working  his  placers;  and  there 
an  occasional  traveler  might  find  accommodations  for 
the  night. 

To  this  stopping  place  there  came  a  Hudson  Bay  trap- 


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per  one  day,  asking  for  a  night's  shelter.  He  had  just 
crossed  the  plains,  he  said;  and  was  full  of  stories  of 
interesting  experiences.  The  morning  after  his  arrival, 
he  accompanied  the  Doctor  down  to  the  placer  claims 
to  see  the  (to  him)  novel  sight  of  gold  washing.  Plung 
ing  his  hand  into  the  Long  Tom,  the  Doctor  took  out 
a  handful  of  black  sand  and  gold,  and  poured  it  into 
the  joined  palms  which  the  trapper  held  out  to  him. 
It  was  unusually  good  that  morning,  containing  a  large 
number  of  good-sized  nuggets.  The  trapper  looked 
at  them  curiously. 

"Is  that  stuff  sure-enough  gold?"  he  asked. 

"Well,"  answered  Doctor  Dane,  amused  at  his  sur 
prise  and  ignorance,  "it  seems  to  satisfy  the  people 
from  whom  we  buy  anything.  They  give  us,  in  ex 
change,  anything  we  want  for  it.  Doesn't  that  prove 
to  you  what  it  is?" 

"If  that's  gold,"  the  trapper  replied,  "I  know  where 
there's  any  amount  of  it!  It's  in  a  place  I  could  easily 
find  again,  too,  for  I  kept  my  horses  in  that  canon  all 
winter — a  fine,  watered  canon  back  near  the  emigrant 
road  that  comes  out  by  the  way  of  High  Rock.  I 
didn't  find  it — the  gold — until  I  went  to  get  my  horses 
in  the  Spring.  There's  lots  of  these  gold  pebbles  in 
the  creek— lots  of  'em!  Why,  I  could  load  my  two 
horses  with  all  they  could  carry,  inside  of  an  hour  of 
hunting  them  and  picking  them  up !" 

He  then  went  on  to  give  the  Doctor  a  detailed  de 
scription  of  the  country  about  there,  and  in  particular 
the  appearance  of  the  canon,  which  was  a  very  long 
one,  he  said.  The  account  he  gave  tallied  precisely 
with  the  description  of  that  canon  where  the  emigrants 
had  found  the  famed  "brass." 

It  was  arranged  that  the  trapper  should  immediately 
take  the  Doctor  to  the  place;  Indian  depredations  hav- 


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ing  become  less  frequent  in  occurrence.  Doctor  Dane, 
loth  to  make  the  long  trip  into  an  unknown  country 
with  an  entire  stranger,  induced  him  to  allow  a  third 
person  to  join  their  little  party.  From  the  first,  the 
trapper  had  said  he  could  easily  retrace  his  way  by 
means  of  his  dead  campfires  to  which  they  would  come 
day  after  day.  And  as  they  went  back  into  the  Desert 
country,  in  no  instance  did  he  fail  to  show  them  where 
he  had  camped  but  a  few  days  before.  Nor  in  any  way 
did  he  do  aught  to  create  suspicion  that  he  was  other 
wise  than  perfectly  honest  in  all  his  declarations. 

Their  route  lay  through  a  country  that  was  strange 
to  the  Doctor,  and  it  was  not  until  he  found  himself 
at  the  head  of  Goose  Lake  Valley,  through  which  he 
had  passed  on  his  way  to  the  West,  that  he  got 
his  bearings.  When  they  reached  Wardner  Hill,  and 
while  standing  on  its  bare  and  level  summit,  from  which 
point  a  magnificent  view  can  be  had  of  the  whole  sur 
rounding  country,  the  trapper  said— pointing  north 
ward  to  where  two  peaks  rose  sixty  or  seventy  miles 
away,  and  which  are  now  known  as  "Steen"  and 
' '  Pueblo ' '  mountains— : 

"There!  That  mountain  to  the  right  is  the  one;  and 
the  canon  is  on  this  side.  That  is  the  place  where  I 
put  my  horses  to  graze.  There  is  a  creek  in  it  that  runs 
a  big  stream  in  the  Spring;  but  in  the  Fall  it  goes 
'most  dry.  The  canon  is  pretty  level  part  of  the  way, 
and  there's  a  fine  lot  of  bunch  grass  all  over  it;  but 
farther  up,  the  walls  are  terrible  high  and  it's  so  rough 
that  it's  about  all  a  horse  can  do  to  get  through  it." 

Two  days'  travel  brought  them  there.  And  Doctor 
Dane  found  the  place  exactly  as  described.  It  fully 
answered  the  description  given  by  the  old  emigrants,  as 
well  as  that  which  the  trapper  had  given  before  start 
ing  out.  The  three  men  were  scarcely  within  the  canon 


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ere  they  came  upon  evidence  of  a  recent  cloudburst. 
The  creek  banks  were  piled  high  with  uprooted  shrubs, 
rose-bushes  and  the  bush  of  the  wild  gooseberry,  buck- 
brush  and  willows,  left  there  by  the  flood.  The  banks 
themselves  were  cut  out,  and  drift  and  brushwood  had 
made  dams  across  the  channel.  Fresh-cut  gullies  were 
everywhere.  The  track  of  the  storm's  devastation 
grew  rougher  as  the  men  penetrated  farther  and  far 
ther  into  the  canon.  At  last,  riding  was  an  impossi 
bility,  and  they  dismounted  to  clamber  over  the  boul 
ders  or  to  creep  around  the  cliffs.  Even  the  creek's 
course  had  been  changed  in  places,  and  a  new  channel 
made.  The  work  the  cloudburst  had  done  was  not  a 
month  old. 

To  find  the  spot  where  he  had  seen  the  nuggets  was 
easy  for  the  trapper,  but  of  nuggets  themselves  there 
were  none  to  be  found.  If  gold  had  ever  been  there, 
it  was  either  hidden  by  the  storm's  debris,  or  had  been 
swept  farther  down  by  the  violence  of  the  flood's  re 
sistless  waters.  They  searched  and  searched,  but  in 
vain.  Having  come  unprepared  to  mine  for  gold  after 
the  usual  placer  fashion,  the  quest  was  for  the  time 
abandoned. 

Had  Doctor  Dane  doubted  for  one  instant  (which 
he  never  did),  the  trapper's  sincerity,  that  doubt 
would  have  been  wholly  dissipated  by  seeing  the  per 
sistence  with  which  the  trapper  prosecuted  his  search; 
by  the  perseverance,  later,  when  a  start  for  home  must 
be  made,  with  which  he  entreated  the  Doctor  to  stay 
yet  longer.  He  declared  over  and  over  again  that  the 
gold  was  there— he  knew  it;  and  Doctor  Dane,  during 
the  days  of  their  search,  became  more  and  more  con 
vinced  that  it  was  so.  Yet  they  had  to  return  to  civil 
ization  without  even  one  small  nugget  to  reward  them 


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for  their  tedious  and  tiring  trip,  or  their  days  of  seek 
ing  for  the  "Blue  Bucket"  gold. 

With  another  year,  however,  the  quest  was  renewed 
—but  not  by  these  men.  And  the  men  who  sought  for 
it  then  were  not  more  eager  and  confident  than  are 
those  who  go  there  today.  For  they  who  believe  in  the 
story,  fairy-tale  or  not,  as  it  may  be,  are  growing  in 
number  with  the  years,  and  every  year  sees  new  con 
verts. 

Some  go  there  boldly— organized  parties  for  pros 
pecting,  willing  the  public  should  know  of  the  object 
of  their  trip— others,  half-ashamed  of  their  own  credu 
lity,  slip  away  by  themselves  into  that  land  of  space 
and  stillness,  and  wander  its  mountain  ways  alone, 
lest  others  may  know,  and  jeer  at  their  faith.  Men 
went  last  year  to  find  the  "Blue  Bucket"  mines;  other 
men  are  there  now.  The  years  wax  and  wane ;  but  time 
does  not  lessen  their  faith.  Always  and  always  will 
there  be  those  who  go  up  and  down  the  length  of  Desert- 
land  seeking  the  mines  that  are  myths;  serving  the 
Sorceress  of  the  sand  wastes  until  the  day  shall  come 
when  they  lie  down  to  rest  on  the  old  Overland  Trail, 
where  the  bones  of  those  who  broke  the  way  were  buried 
in  the  long  ago. 


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A  MEMORY  OF  THE  DESERT. 


A 

Memory 

of 

the 

Desert, 


UESTS  there  have   been  that  promised 
fulfillment    without    stint    and   without 
fail,  only  to  prove— just  as  one's  out- 
reached  hand  caught  at  the  garments  of 
Fortune— it  was  but  a  vision  more  tanta 
lizing  than  any  mirage.    And  one  easily 
sees   visions,    in   that   land    of   visible   and   invisible 
mysteries. 

Once,  there  was  one  that  I  knew— one  who  was  count 
ed  too  sane  to  see  visions  and  too  wise  to  be  deceived — 
who  went  a-search  for  diamonds,  there  in  the  Desert. 
Topaz,  and  turquoise,  and  other  things  of  beauty  are 
there,  but  of  diamonds  none  have  been  found. 

To  one  of  the  wee  towns  that  make  scattered  dots  on 
the  map  of  Nevada  southward  from  the  Black  Rock 
country,  there  came  an  old  prospector;  and  he  singled 
out  this  man,  from  all  whom  he  knew,  to  take  into  his 
confidence  and  make  half-owner  in  the  wonderful 
diamond  mines  he  had  found.  He  brought  with  him  a 
sack  of  the  gems,  to  prove  the  truth  of  his  assertions— 
a  canvas  bag  full  of  sparkling  white  things  that  under 
the  gaslight,  as  they  were  spread  out,  were  beautiful 
enough  to  be  real.  Such  a  sight!  Long,  long  after 
ward  I,  too,  saw  them,  and  I  did  not  wonder  that  ignor 
ance  of  the  diamond  in  its  rough  state,  might  very  well 
help  a  man  to  believe  in  these— to  think  them  the  gems 


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they  looked  to  be.  There  must  have  been  fifty  pounds 
of  the  pretty,  worthless  baubles  that  were  poured  into 
a  bright  and  new  tin  pan,  and  filled  it  well  to  the  brim. 
It  seemed  impossible  that  they  had  not  been  cut  by  a 
lapidary,  so  perfect  were  they  on  all  sides.  Not  crystals 
as  we  know  them,  pointed  on  one  end  only ;  but  polished, 
and  true,  with  facets  cut  by  Nature  on  every  side.  The 
most  beautiful  crystals  I  have  ever  seen,  and  of  a  sort 
that  I  had  never  come  across  here  in  the  West. 

Out  beyond  the  Quin  River  Desert,  the  Old  Prospector 
found  them,  believing  them  to  be  diamonds  of  worth. 
They  were  lying  about  in  quantities,  sprinkling  the 
sand  wastes  off  there  at  the  Desert's  edge,  where  the 
sands  gather  together  in  dunes,  only  to  scatter  them 
selves  broadcast,  as  grain  is  tossed  from  the  hand  of 
the  sower.  So  the  winds  cover  and  uncover  them ;  and 
to  them,  one  day,  came  these  men  believing  in  their 
worth;  and  many  a  dollar  that  might  have  gone  better 
ways,  went  toward  the  gathering  of  what  came,  later, 
to  shame  them  for  their  simple  credulity. 

Others  (and  I  among  them,  also)  found  copper  out 
there— melted  copper  that  I  took  from  its  home  in  the 
mountain,  where  it  had  been  melted  by  the  great  con 
flagration.  It  seemed  easy  to  believe  the  Desert's  treas 
ure-trove  might  well  be  there.  It  is  so  easy  to  dream  of 
things  that  never  present  themselves  to  one  in  lands 
where  strange  things  do  not  intrude.  But  here  it  would 
seem  that  any  marvebus  thing  might  very  well  be ;  the 
country  is  so  weird— so  unusual— so  unlike  our  every 
day  world.  You  find  yourself  looking  for  all  sorts  of 
impossible  things  to  happen.  You  find  yourself  say 
ing:  "Why  not?" 

But  my  handfuls  of  copper  were  all  there  were— there 
was  never  a  sign  of  a  ledge.  Just  melted  bits  from  a 


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the 

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"blow-out"— spewed  out  by  the  earth's  internal  fires, 
with  its  parent  ledge  leagues  upon  leagues  away. 

And  a  sulphur  mine  that  I  tried  to  conquer?  Did  it 
not  become  conqueror  itself?  It  fought  me  with  fire, 
though  hidden,  and  so  drove  me  away.  Yet,  I  have 
heard  that  others  have  now  gone  there  to  do  what  I,  in 
vain,  tried  to  do.  Will  they  succeed,  or  will  they,  too, 
be  vanquished  by  the  earth's  better  weapon?  Or,  will 
the  Desert  have  gone  back  to  its  way  of  old,  and  become 
cool  once  more,  as  it  was  away  back  in  the  early  'six 
ties?  I  often  ponder  over  it.  It  was  a  mystery  then, 
it  is  a  mystery  still. 


A  DESERT  MYSTERY. 


OU  may  try  as  you  will  to  comprehend, 
in  its  entirety,  the  awful  tragedy  of 
Pelee  and  La  Soufriere— to  grasp  it  as 
something  of  modern  times  and  real— yet, 
as  you  read,  you  are  aware  it  seems  as 
remote  from  our  day  as  the  stories  of 
Pompeii  and  Herculaneum,  and  more  than  half  fiction. 
It  was  too  appalling  a  tragedy— too  stupendous  a 
death-roll,  for  the  comprehension  of  any  but  those  who 
afterward  stood  in  the  silence  where  once  there  was 
sound,  and  saw  the  fearful  dead  that  bestrewed  the 
places  where  once  the  living  walked.  Under  the  shadow 
of  its  black  phophesy  the  people  worked  or  played, 
loved  and  married,  bore  children  and  buried  them— 
living  out  the  measure  of  their  days  unheedful  of  the 
thing  that  was,  some  day,  to  come.  None  who  live  with 
in  a  volcano's  possible  reach  but  know  its  danger;  yet 
who  will  ever  believe  that  he  himself  is  to  be  in  the 
pathway  of  its  wrath? 

And  how  thin  the  old  Earth's  crust  is,  over  her  mighty 
f.res !  And  the  warnings  that  she  sends  before  her  out 
breaks—how  little  are  they  heeded !  Man  only  believes 
in  danger  when  that  danger  has  come. 

With  my  thoughts  dwelling  upon  the  Earth's  vagar 
ies;  of  the  uncertainty  of  her  temper  where  her  fires 
burn  the  fiercest,  I  am  reminded  of  a  certain  place 


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Mystery 


where,  once,  I  found  a  subterranean  temperature  that 
was  tremendous. 

It  was  a  strange  thing  that  I  came  upon,  that  time. 
Let  me  tell  you  of  it. 

It  was  in  January,  1900,  that  I  formed  a  partnership 
with  a  former  associate  in  gold  mining,  to  prospect  for 
sulphur  deposits  in  Northern  Nevada.  There  are  vast 
beds  of  pure  sulphur  (the  largest  in  the  United  States, 
unless  those  of  Louisiana  that  lie  under  the  sea  are 
included)  lying  west  of  north  of  the  Central  Pacific 
Railroad,  and  forty  miles  away  from  its  threads  of  steel. 
They  are  the  great  Humboldt  sulphur  mines,  so  well 
mown.  Following  that  trend  all  the  way  to  the  Oregon 
[ine  are  scattered  indications  of  sulphur  throughout  that 
weird  and  barren  land  that  the  great  lava  flow  of  the 
North  has  spread  itself  over. 

For  our  initial  work,  we  selected  a  district  a  short 
distance  westward  from  the  railroad  station  of  Hum 
boldt.  As  early  as  the  late  '60 's  I  had  had  knowledge 
of  small  prospect  hole  at  that  especial  place;  and,  as 
it  was  within  a  hundred  and  fifty  yards  of  the  railroad 
track  (thus  solving  the  problem  of  cheap  transporta 
tion,  which,  in  that  land  of  long  distances  is  the  most 
serious  drawback  to  the  development  of  mines  carrying 
small  "values")  we  determined  to  begin  our  operations 
there. 

Just  prior  to  the  laying  of  the  Central  Pacific's  rails 
through  the  great  gray  valley  of  the  Humboldt— the 
one-time-called  "River  of  Death"— these  beds  were 
located  by  James  Spence;  and  from  the  single  prospect 
hole  (an  incline  of  not  more  than  thirty  feet  in  depth) 
he  took  some  fifteen  or  twenty  tons  of  sulphur.  Two 
"mountain  schooners"  (Nevada's  desert  camel  of  the 
early  days),  driven  by  himself  and  Henry  Childers, 
had  carried  the  crude  ore  into  Virginia  City,  where  it 


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became  the  property  of  Hy  Barnes,  and— an  unprofit 
able  speculation.  I  name  these  people  to  you  because 
they  were  real  people,  even  as  the  stories  are  real.  In 
cabins  and  by  camp-fires  I  have  heard  old  miners  tell 
these  things  so  often  that  the  names  of  these  men  are 
as  familiar  to  me  as  my  own.  Hy  Barnes  could  not  dis 
pose  of  it,  and  the  months  that  came  saw  it  lying  there 
—a  flaming  yellow  pyramid  on  the  side  of  Mount 
Davidson.  This  was  in  Virginia  City's  palmy  days. 
Later— for  that  must  have  been  in  '64  or  '65— when 
the  Central  Pacific  Railroad  Company  was  building 
its  snowsheds  over  the  Sierra  Nevada  mountains,  and 
bolt-holes  were  being  drilled  into  the  rock  walls,  to 
which  the  sheds  cling  like  swallows'  nests  against  a 
cliff,  sulphur  was  needed  for  securing  the  bolts  in  place* 
Into  these  holes  smoking-hot  sulphur  was  poured  as 
the  iron  rods  were  driven  home,  to  hold  them  firmly; 
it  having  that  unusual  quality  of  non-shrinkage  in 
cooling,  peculiar  to  itself.  The  sulphur  used  in  the 
work— two  tons— was  taken  from  the  surface  of  the 
ground  on  the  old  Spence  claim.  No  other  work  had 
ever  been  done  there.  So  much  was  history.  It  was 
generally  thought,  by  those  interested  in  mining,  that 
it  had  been  simply  a  "blow-out"  from  some  untrace- 
able  deposit,  and  that  it  was  not  worth  the  prospecting. 
Although  I  knew  of  it  earlier,  I  was  too  young  to 
take  any  special  note  of  it  until  about  the  year  1873. 
At  that  time  it  attracted  my  attention  by  reason  of 
the  very  great  number  of  freshly-shed  snake-skins  that 
lay  about  in  the  crevices  of  the  gypsum  and  lava,  the 
sulphur  and  ash.  Dozens  of  them !  Hundreds  of  them ! 
And,  paying  heed  to  the  fact,  I  observed  thereafter 
that  each  spring  they  were  replaced  by  others,  while 
the  old  ones  were  blown  away  by  the  whirlwinds. 
Evidently  it  was  a  famous  place  for  reptiles;  yet  it 


A 

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was  a  puzzle  to  me,  always,  that  in  such  a  quarry  of 
snake-skins,  I  should  never  chance  to  see  the  snakes 
themselves. 

Back  in  those  years  when  I  first  knew  sagebrush- 
land  as  home,  I  was  an  omniverous— if  not  always  a 
discriminating— reader ;  and,  on  summer  days  when 
the  desert  sun  shoqe  hot  and  a  particularly  fascinating 
book  fell  into  my  hands,  I  at  once  sought  some  spot 
that  offered  both  cool  shade  and  quiet.  What  better 
place  than  just  within  the  deserted  incline  of  the  old 
sulphur  mine?  There,  surrounded  by  the  white  and 
yellow  of  gypsum  and  sulphur  walls  festooned  with 
the  silvery-white  skins,  I  had  a  retreat  all  my  own,  and 
quite  as  full  of  charm  to  me  as  any  rose-hung  bower 
could  have  been  to  another  girl — a  girl  not  of  the  gray 
wastes  and  solitudes  of  the  Desert.  There,  with  eyes 
and  heart  deep  buried  in  my  books,  I  spent  many  and 
many  a  delightful  hour,  retreating  farther  and  farther 
down  the  incline,  as  the  afternoon  sun  found  and  fol 
lowed  fche  in  there.  For — burn  as  it  might  outside — 
it  was  always  a  delightfully  cool  place  within  the  in 
cline.  There  were  times  when,  with  an  old  broken 
shovel  I  found  there,  I  dug  into  the  bottom  of  the  de 
serted  prospect-hole  for  specimens  of  sulphur  crystals 
—those  delicate  clusters  of  glittering  yellow  jewels 
that  belong  to  fairyland— yet,  dig  deep  as  I  would 
into  the  soft  ash  and  gypsum,  I  never  observed  the 
slightest  indication  of  heat.  I  know  that  in  those  days 
there  was  no  indication  of  subterranean  heat  whatever. 

Then— by  and  by— I  left  the  Desert  for  a  home  at 
tide- water;  and  straightway  forgot  all  about  he  sul 
phur  beds,  until  years  afterward,  when  I  was  reminded 
of  them  by  hearing  of  a  skeleton  that  had  been  found 
there. 

In  1888  or  '89,  Samuel  H.  Kitto  and  Dan  Merrigan, 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


107 


two  young  men  out  for  a  jaunt  one  spring  morning, 
came  unexpectedly  upon  the  bleached  bones  of  an  un 
known  man  lying  at  the  foot  of  a  hollow  cone  that  is 
commonly  known  as  "the  Crater,"  half  a  mile  from 
the  old  prospect-hole.  Nothing  was  found  whereby 
the  dead  man  might  have  been  identified.  There  was 
no  paper,  no  article  of  clothing— absolutely  nothing 
except  an  open  and  rusty  razor  lying  by  his  side.  Of 
course  the  Coroner  came,  as  the  law  provided;  and 
there  was  the  usual  farce  of  an 'inquest  on  a  fragment 
of  what  had  once  been  human.  Then  the  sun-and- 
storm-whitened  bones  were  carried  to  the  railroad  sta 
tion  and  buried  in  the  little  graveyard  where  the  dead 
are  mostly  nameless— tramps  killed  by  some  passing 
train,  or  (as  this  one)  a  fleshless  skeleton  found  far 
away  from  wagon  road  or  railroad  track.  Their  stories 
are  unknown  and  their  graves  unmarked. 

It  was  at  "the  Crater"— after  doing  some  prelim 
inary  location  work  at  the  point  where  Spence  had 
once  worked  the  claim— that  we  decided  to  sink  our 
first  shaft.  This  cone  is  one  of  a  number  of  such  vent- 
holes  that  can  be  traced  thereabouts— vent-holes  for 
furnaces  that  were  burned  out  centuries  ago.  Fires 
have  burned  and  died;  great  mountain  ranges  have 
been  lifted  high  on  either  side  of  the  valley,  down  in 
which  the  vents  are  now  all  but  covered  by  the  valley's 
soil.  Only  this  one  lifts  itself  distinctive— rising  sharp 
ly  a  few  feet  from  the  level  of  the  plain,  to  be  seen  sev 
eral  miles  away.  The  valley  here  is  quite  flat— broad, 
long,  and  a  dead  level.  There  are  great  alkali  flats, 
absolutely  bare  and  miles  wide;  but  where  the  sul 
phur  beds  are,  grease  wood— short,  scrubby  and  dead- 
looking—grows  sparsely.  Now  and  then  the  ground 
is  sprinkled  with  gravel  and  flakes  of  quartz  washed 
down  from  the  mountains. 


A 

Desert, 
Mystery 


io8 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


A 
Desert* 

Mystery 


All  the  way  from  the  railroad  track  (which  here 
runs  northeast  and  southwest)  to  the  river,  two  or 
three  miles  away,  one  may  find  indications  of  sulphur. 
And  when  one  comes  to  the  river  itself,  one  finds  other 
cones,  quite  unlike  these,  are  fantastically  topped  with 
a  lime-crust  that  has  resisted  the  erosion  which  has 
eaten  the  lower  strata  away.  The  same  hard  crust 
overlies  the  whole  valley  here  for  miles  and  miles, 
barely  hidden  under  a  thin  veneer  of  soil.  But  down 
by  the  cones  by  the  river's  edge  (the  river  of  today, 
whose  course  is  through  the  centre  of  the  mile-wide 
channel  of  the  great  river  of  the  dead  years),  one  may 
easily  trace  the  strata  downward  Far  below  the  crust's 
line.  First,  the  mushroom-shaped  lime  topping,  whose 
jagged  edges  in  many  places  have  taken  unto  them 
selves  the  semblance  of  grotesque,  unkenned  creatures 
— dragons  and  gargoyles,  and  strange  open- jawed 
monsters  that  seem  born  of  some  nightmare.  Next,  a 
broad  band  of  almost  pure  salt— two  to  three  feet  in 
depth;  then  gypsum  and  volcanic  ash  plentifully 
streaked  with  sulphur,  down  to  the  level  of  the  ancient 
river  bed.  They  are  queer  things,  these  cones  that 
have  been  fashioned  by  creeks  cut  by  short-lived  floods 
born  from  the  cloud-bursts  on  the  high  lands;  and 
yearly  erosion  is  eating  them  more  surely  away. 

But  none  of  these,  in  spite  of  the  evidence  of  sul 
phur,  are  kindred  with  "the  Crater."  "There,  where 
we  made  our  locations  (which  through  their  brimstone 
suggestiveness  seemed  to  name  themselves  Aetna, 
Vesuvius,  Popocatapetl,  Yztaccihuatl,  Mauna  Loa  and 
Kilauea),  is  lava  and  pumice  in  plenty;  and  in  walking 
over  the  ground— especially  if  it  be  on  a  little  rise- 
one  hears  the  echo  of  his  footsteps  as  though  the  sound 
were  sent  back  from  a  great  vault  beneath— a  hollow 
echo  that  tells  of  vast  caverns  underground. 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


109 


I  know  too  little  of  scientific  lore  to  dare  say  what 
the  conditions  we  found  there  may  indicate;  I  can  only 
tell  what  we  discovered  during  our  weeks  of  prospect 
ing,  and  will  leave  to  others  the  task  of  translating  the 
signs  that  puzzle  us  still. 

We  began  sinking  the  shaft  in  "the  Crater"  on  the 
twenty-ninth  of  January.  The  only  men  working  on 
the  claims  at  that  time  were  my  partner  and  one  of 
his  sons.  Later,  the  younger  manX  j>lace  was  taken 
by  an  Indian— a  young  Paiute. 

Though  it  is  no  part  of  this  story,  yet  just  here  let 
me  tell  what  we  found  during  the  morning  of  that  first 
day's  work.  There,  in  "the  Crater,"  bjut  two  or  three 
feet  down,  we  came  on  the  skeleton  of  a  man  that  had 
been  thrust  (not  buried  in  decent  wise— but  jammed) 
into  the  hollow  hole  which  the  wind-drifts  of  each 
year  had  covered  still  deeper  with  the  powdered 
pumice  and  gypsum  and  ash  tossed  down  from  the 
brim  of  the  wee  "crater." 

The  side  of  the  skull  was  crushed  in,  and  the  body 
bent  nearly  double,  as  though  hurriedly  crowded  into 
a  hole  too  small  for  honest  burial.  The  story?  Who 
knows?  Did  that  other— the  one  found  years  before 

but  a  few  yards  from  tfiis  spot— did  he ?  But  who 

can  say?  It  is  but  another  mystery  of  that  great,  gray 
land  of  mysteries. 

The  skeleton  fell  apart  when  unearthed  and  lay  on 
the  crater's  edge,  where  it  was  cast  up  by  the  shovels, 
a  heap  of  fragile  brown  bones  that  seemed  more  like 
strips  and  bits  of  wet  pasteboard  than  anything  else. 
The  water-soaked  ash  (there  had  been  an  unusually 
warm  period  for  January,  and  the  snow  of  the  valleys 
was  melted,  completely  saturating  the  ground)  and 
the  moistened  sulphur-stained  formation  we  found 
there  had  communicated  to  the  bones  a  peculiar  flexi- 


A 

Desert* 
Mystery 


no 


In  Miners*  Mirage-Land 


A 

Desert* 

Mystery 


bility;  for  they  bent  between  our  fingers  like  whale 
bone.  It  was  an  uncanny  thing  to  find  at  the  very  out 
set  of  our  work ;  so  we  quickly  buried  them  again,  giv 
ing  them  sepulture  in  the  * ' Popocatapetl's "  location 
monument  at  the  crater's  rim.  All  but  the  skull  and 
thigh  bones— they  were  set  aside  to  find  place  with 
many  another  strange  thing  that  came  out  of  the 
Desert  in  my  strangely-lived  Desert  life. 

We  were  still  under  the  spell  that  the  grewsome 
"find"  had  cast  over  us,  when  the  shaft  developed 
something  even  more  mysterious— an  unsolved  mys 
tery  to  this  day,  at  least  to  the  four  persons  who,  so 
far  as  I  know,  are  the  only  ones  who  have  known  of  it. 

After  the  last  slabs  of  lava-rock  had  been  replaced 
upon  the  monument,  I  dropped  over  the  rim  into  the 
pit,  and  clambered  down  to  the  shaft.  "The  Crater" 
(such  a  baby  crater  it  is!)  was  filled  well  to  the  top 
with  a  fine  gray  volcanic  ash— dry  on  top,  a  bit  moist 
from  the  rains  beneath;  while  scattered  through  it 
were  quantities  of  the  rough,  unfriendly  rock  that 
made  the  crust  of  the  cone.  In  the  centre  of  this  was 
the  hole  that  was  yet  too  small  to  be  dignified  by  the 
name  of  a  shaft. 

From  the  bottom  of  the  excavation  my  partner 
scooped  up  a  handful  of  the  moist  earth  and  asked  me 
to  hold  out  my  hands.  I  did  so,  and  he  poured  it  in. 
It  was  warm! — perceptibly  so.  I  was  astounded — too 
puzzled  to  say  anything;  and  I  stood  there  holding  it, 
looking  stupidly  at  him  for  an  explanation.  He 
laughed ;  and.  then,  throwing  out  a  shovelful  or  two 
from  the  shaft,  took  from  underneath  some  that  was 
freshly  uncovered. 

"Here,  take  this!" 

I  don't  remember  what  I  said,  but  I  cried  out  in  as- 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


tonishment  as  I  let  it  fall.  It  was  hot !— not  just  warm, 
but  hot! 

That  was  the  beginning  of  what,  for  weeks 
and  weeks,  was  to  us  a  daily  wonder.  Seven  or  eight 
feet  beneath  the  surface  of  the  ground  we  would  find 
this  unexplainable  heat.  Not  alone  at  that  particular 
place,  but  over  a  five-mile  area,  we  found  like  condi 
tions.  On  the  slope  just  below  the  old  prospect  hole 
we  came  on  ground  that  was  covered  here  and  there 
with  the  so-called  "petrified  grass"— salt  grass  and 
the  three-cornered  stems  of  Paiute  grass,  over  which, 
at  some  former  time,  lime-impregnated  waters  from 
hot  springs  had  flowed.  I  tried  to  answer  all  the  ques 
tions  that  came  crowding  in  upon  me,  by  saying  to  my 
self  that,  at  some  time  in  the  remote  past,  there  had 
been  boiling  springs  here— springs  that  were  now 
sealed  up.  But  when  I  remembered  that  a  quarter  of 
a  century  before,  the  earth  in  the  bottom  of  Spence's 
old  incline  was  cold,  I  felt"  that  such  explanations  were 
inadequate.  Nowhere,  in  all  our  knowledge  of  the 
valley,  had  there  ever  been  steam,  or  fire,  or  heat. 
I  went  into  the  camps  of  my  Paiute  friends  and  ques 
tioned  the  elders.  None  of  them,  nor  their  fathers, 
nor  their  fathers'  fathers  before  them,  had  ever  heard 
of  a  time  when  the  valley  had  spit  steam  or  fire;  and 
their  legends  (told  by  father  to  son  as  they  sit  by  the 
campfire,  and  memorized  with  infinite  accuracy)  date 
back  to  a  time  earlier  than  the  white  man's  history. 

Shaft  after  shaft  was  sunk,  and  sulphur  in  plenty 
was  found.  Some  of  it  was  crystalized;  and  much  of 
it  was  colored  like  a  California  poppy.  Elsewhere  we 
found  a  snow-white  marvel  of  sulphur— sulphur  that 
turned  yellow  only  when  a  lighted  match  was  touched 
to  it,  and  was  ninety-five  per  cent  pure!  Now  and 
then  we  came  upon  "black"  sulphur— that  glassy, 


A 

Desert* 

Mystery 


112 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


A 

Desert* 
Mystery 


dark-green  sort  made  by  nature  in  those  molds  where 
pressure  is  greatest.  Where  lime  rock  was,  we  found 
pisolite  and  oolite  in  small  quantities.  That  meant 
there  had  been,  at  some  time,  boiling  springs.  But 
such  places  were  few.  In  the  deeper  shafts,  volcanic 
ash  was  found  in  undisturbed  strata.  Volcanic  rock 
and  lava  were  everywhere ;  and  the  lava  was  frequent 
ly  streaked  with  cinnabar.  Sometimes  a  waxy  forma 
tion  would  be  encountered  that  discouraged  work  at 
that  point.  It  would  not  break,  as  rock  ordinarily 
will,  from  shots  of  giant  powder;  but  was  of  a  texture 
that  refused  to  be  shattered  when  blasted,  and  was 
too  hard  to  be  worked  with  picks.  And  everywhere 
was  that  mysterious  heat. 

When  we  were  some  fifteen  feet  down  the  deepest 
shaft  we  sunk,  I  wrote  to  the  California  Academy  of 
Sciences  describing  the  conditions  there  (but  not  nam 
ing  the  locality)  and  asked  if  a  similar  state  of  affairs 
was  known  to  exist  anywhere  else  in  the  world.  They 
were  unable  to  give  me  any  information  on  the  subject, 
but  referred  the  letter  to  Prof.  Branner,  of  Stanford 
University.  In  reply  to  my  brief  outline  of  conditions 
he  wrote  as  follows: 

"I  regret  to  say  that  I  do  not  know  of  any  such  place 
as  you  mention  in  your  letter.  The  temperature  of 
the  crust  of  the  earth  varies  so  much,  however,  in  dif 
ferent  places  that  no  fixed  law  has  ever  been  found 
for  the  downward  increase  of  the  temperature,  except 
of  local  application.  In  the  Comstock  mining  region, 
the  temperature  is  one  degree  for  every  twenty-eight 
feet,  down  to  3,000  feet;  in  the  north  of  England,  it 
is  one  degree  for  forty-nine  feet ;  in  New  South  Wales, 
it  is  one  degree  for  eighty  feet;  in  Leipsic,  it  is  one 
degree  for  fifty-six  feet;  at  Grass  Valley,  Cal.,  it  is 
one  degree  for  one  hundred  and  seven  feet ;  in  the  cop- 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


per  mines  of  Michigan,  it  is  one  degree  for  two  hun 
dred  and  twenty-four  feet,  and  so  on." 

Up  and  down,  back  and  forth,  we  prospected,  sink 
ing  shafts  where  we  could— tasting  it,  smelling  it,  test 
ing  it  with  a  match.  The  whole  district,  so  far  as  we 
investigated,  is  richly  underlaid  with  sulphur;  but 
everywhere  that  we  sunk  on  the  claims  we  found  that 
strange  heat — a  heat  too  great  to  permit  our  continuing 
the  work.  Where  the  lava  was  encountered  in  great 
est  quantities,  we  uncovered  the  home  of  the  snakes, 
for  it  was  as  full  of  bubble  holes  as  a  honey-comb  is 
of  cells.  There,  long,  slim  (and  entirely  harmless) 
snakes  were  housed  in  numbers  that  were  appalling. 
When  the  explosions  disturbed  them  from  their 
winter's  rest,  they  had  crawled  to  the  walls  of  the 
shafts,  through  the  network  of  cracks  that  underlie 
the  district,  and,  tumbling  down  to  the  bottom,  coiled, 
and  lifted,  and  writhed  there,  vainly  trying  to  get  out, 
and  quite  unpleasing  things  to  see. 

The  weather  turned  cold— eight  degrees  below  zero. 
But  the  temperature  underground  was  growing  hotter 
and  hotter,  the  deeper  the  shaft  was  sunk.  At  eighteen 
feet  each  man  who  worked  there  suffered  from  fright 
ful  headaches,  and  the  younger  man  had  to  return  to 
his  home  in  Sacramento.  Their  clothing — even  their 
buckskin  gloves— rotted  as  they  worked,  and  their 
skin  burned  and  stung.  The  drill's  point  in  a  few  mo 
ments  would  become  so  hot  that  it  caused  discomfort 
to  touch  it  with  the  bare  hand.  After  a  series  of 
blasts  had  been  put  off,  and  the  smoke  had  escaped 
from  the  shaft,  a  cloud  of  vapor  would  arise  while 
the  mercury  marked  zero  at  the  top;  and  the  rock 
thrown  up  from  the  bottom  was  so  hot  that  it  could 
not  be  handled  at  all  bare-handed. 


A 

Desert, 

Mystery 


114 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


A 

Desert* 
Mystery 


Each  night  the  giant  powder  froze.  Each  morning 
it  was  thawed  in  a  few  minutes  by  throwing  it  over  a 
wheelbarrow  load  of  rock  and  ash  from  the  bottom  of 
the  shaft.  Sometimes  all  the  sticks  of  powder  in  the 
box  would  be  frozen  together,  and  the  mass  frozen  to 
the  box  itself;  but  by  the  time  the  drill-hole  was  ready 
for  it,  the  powder  would  be  found  thawed.  Canteens 
of  water,  carried  by  the  men  coming  to  work,  were 
frozen  solid.  Buried  in  the  broken  bits  of  rock  a  few 
moments,  the  ice  would  immediately  melt.  By  and 
by— as  the  work  progressed  further  downward— the 
drills  became  so  hot  that  their  temper  was  destroyed 
(and,  incidentally,  our  own)  and  the  men  could  make 
but  little  headway  in  their  work.  Still  they  kept  on 
—changing  shift  every  few  minutes,  and  being  hauled 
to  the  top  with  faces  burning  red,  down  which  rivulets 
of  sweat  ran. 

Some  of  the  time  it  was,  as  has  been  said,  zero 
weather;  but  on  the  warmest  day  the  mercury  marked 
fifty  degrees.  The  shaft  waa  down  twenty-three  feet. 
The  mercury  marked  120°  wnen  taken  to  the  bottom 
of  the  shaft  as  soon  as  a  man  could  descend  after  the 
shots  had  been  fired.  At  twenty-nine  feet  it  registered 
one  hundred  and  forty  degrees.  The  men— working 
five-minute  shifts— sank  a  foot  deeper;  but  the  ex 
perience  of  the  last  one  down  was  such  that  not  one 
of  them  would  again  venture  into  that  furnace  of 
frightful  heat,  and  the  temperature  after  that  last  shot 
was  not  taken.  They  were  satisfied  with  the  knowledge 
already  obtained— that  the  heat  had  increased  some 
thing  like  ninety  degrees  in  twenty-nine  feet,  at  the 
point  where  the  old  Spence  shaft  was— where,  more 
than  five-and- twenty  years  ago,  it  was  a  cool  and  pleas 
ant  place  to  sit  and  read  in  on  summer  afternoons ! 

Are  there  fires  underneath?     Or  sealed-up  boiling 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


springs?  Or  gases  that  create  heat?  Or  what?  We 
had  all  sorts  of  theories,  of  course;  and  we  talked  to 
gether  of  the  statements  that  had  been  made  to  us  that 
there  were  places  in  the  valley  where  the  ground  had 
settled  unaccountably  during  the  previous  ten  years; 
and  we  did  a  great  deal  of  wondering.  But  all  our 
speculations  left  us  baffled  and  bewildered.  And  be 
cause  we  could  not  satisfy  ourselves  as  to  the  causes, 
we  said  nothing  of  the  affair  to  anyone  else.  The  few 
folk  who  live  within  sight  of  the  ground,  and  the  hun 
dreds  that  pass  over  it  in  railway  cars  every  day,  have 
never  heard  nor  known  of  these  things  that  would 
seem  to  me  now  (living  here  in  rose-land  by  the  sea, 
and  "where  things  never  happen")  but  a  dream,  did 
I  not  have,  as  proof  of  it  really  having  happened,  over 
the  door  of  my  den— where  I  can  look  up  and  see  it 
as  I  write— the  skull  and  crossbones  of  the  man  of 
"Popocatapetl." 

People  came  there  to  visit  the  "prospects,"  but  not 
till  after  the  deepest  shafts  had  been  partially  refilled, 
that  stray  horses  and  cattle  might  not  fall  in  them,  to 
be  killed  or  crippled.  Some  of  the  smaller  shafts  there 
were,  in  which  (had  they  but  closely  noticed)  some 
heat  might  have  been  observed.  But  much  of  the  heat 
disappeared  after  the  shafts  had  been  exposed  to  the 
air  for  a  while.  So  the  visitors  went  away,  discovering 
nothing  unusual,  at  least  up  to  the  time  when  I  aban 
doned  the  claims  as  impracticable  for  working. 

Sulphur  there  is  a-plenty,  but  it  is  guarded  by  an 
inferno  of  subterranean  heat  that  puts  it  far  beyond 
the  reach  of  the  miner's  pick  and  drill.  Will  the  heat 
that  so  strangely  came,  after  a  while  subside?  Who 
can  say  what  may  happen?  I  only  know  it  is  a  place 
of  serpents  and  sulphurous  smells,  of  strange  heat,  of 
dead  men's  bones,  and  mystery.  Such  places  are  best 
let  alone.  I— for  one— want  no  more  of  them. 


A 

Desert, 

Mystery 


, 


The 

Toll 

of 

the 

Desert* 


THE  TOLL  OF  THE  DESERT. 

IRAGE  of  Water,  or  Mirage  of  a  Mine! 
It  matters  not  which  it  may  be,  the  end 
is  the  same  for  him  who  follows  after 
the  Siren  who  is  always  in  league  with 
Death.  All  the  years  of  his  life  the  Old 
Prospector  gives  to  the  Desert  his  best 
and  his  all— gives  hope,  and  joy,  and  love,  even  as  he 
gave  youth.  He  gives  his  very  soul;  then,  finally,  he 
commits  his  body  to  the  Desert's  keeping— to  sleep  there 
in  its  everlasting  silence.  It  is  the  final  toll  that  the 
Desert  takes  of  a  man.  Cruel?  Nay,  the  Desert  is 
kind;  for  in  death  the  body  rests  where  the  heart  found 
its  joy  in  life.  What  lover  could  ask  more? 

The  sands,  that  knew  his  every  footfall,  cradle  him. 
The  everlasting  mountains— the  heights  he  loved— 
stand  watch  and  ward.  And  the  night-wind,  that  was 
with  him  when  he  lay  out  under  the  stars,  shall  sing 
his  slumber-song  now,  as  some  Indian  mother  croons 
over  the  babe  that,  in  the  twilight,  falls  asleep  at  her 
breast.  In  such  wise,  does  the  Old  Prospector  find  rest 
in  the  Desert. 

In  such  wise,  would  all  lovers  of  that  land  meet  the 
end.  To  go  to  sleep  there  under  the  white  stars;  to 
go  away  into  the  land  of  dreams,  lying  in  the  arms  of 
the  Desert;  to  rest— and  rest—  and  rest,  through  all 
time,  through  centuries  of  silence  and  solitude !  What 
would  you  that  one  (loving  the  land)  should  have, 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


117 


when  the  Night  comes,  that  could  be  more  desired? 
They  who  have  lived  long  there  ask  for  no  other  bural, 
be  assured. 

And  of  this,  too,  you  may  be  sure.  If  you  have  goie 
into  the  Desert  and  found  its  Soul,  you  have  climbed 
more  than  half-way  up  the  ladder  that  reaches  God- 
ward.  Therefore,  I  say,  these  men  who  live  there  are 
not  men  without  religion;  though  creeds  they  may 
not  (and  probably  do  not)  claim  as  theirs.  But  it  is 
not  a  far  thing  from  reverence,  as  one  knows  it  in  a 
temple,  to  stand  with  voice  hushed  and  ear  inclined, 
while  God  and  the  Desert  speak  together.  Not  once 
a  week — on  the  Sabbath — is  this  so.  But  it  is  part  of 
what  comes  to  one  (though  unconsciously,  mayhap) 
daily.  They  know  it,  but  give  it  no  name. 

So  you  will  understand  that  he  who  has  lived  there 
—if  he  has  lived  a  life  that  has  harmed  no  man— dies 
unafraid.  To  spend  many  years  of  one's  life  there,  in 
the  gray  land,  takes  away  the  coward  fear  of  Death. 
That  is  because  one  has  learned  to  measure  all  things 
in  the  balance  of  just  proportion;  and  then  one  comes 
to  see  how  small  is  the  atom,  Self.  More!  This  truth 
is  taught  in  Nature's  wisdom— that  all  things  are  best. 
He  has  led  the  life  he  believed  was  best;  and  he  be 
lieves  it  is  best  that  so  he  should  die. 

"Earth  to  earth,  dust  to  dust,  ashes  to  ashes."  If 
you  come  upon  some  Desert  grave  one  day  as  you  ride 
along  any  of  the  roads  of  old  days,  and  if  the  words 
of  the  burial  service  come  to  you  as  you  draw  rein 
there,  do  not  hesitate  to  add:  "In  sure  and  certain 
hope  of  the  Resurrection."  For  none  died  without 
religion— as  all  great  silence  and  space  teaches  re 
ligion—and  few  died  without  hope. 

And  this  shall  you  remember.  Though  the  Desert 
in  its  time  takes  full  toll  of  the  men  who  go  there;  yet 
never  do  they  give  unwillingly. 


The 

Toll 

of 

*hr 

Desert* 


Groves 

of 

the 

Desert, 


GRAVES  OF  THE  DESERT. 

RAVES  of  the  Desert!  Forgotten 
graves.  How  many  there  are !  In  lonely 
places  by  the  wayside,  where  civilized 
man  has  not  yet  succeeded  in  making 
"two  blades  of  grass  to  grow"  where 
once  there  was  but  the  wide  sweep  of 
shifting,  drifting  sands;  where  still  are  found  Desert 
stretches,  alternating  with  the  green  oases  which  follow 
in  the  white  man's  wake  across  the  plains,  there  are 
the  graves  of  men  fifty  years  dead— graves  that  bear 
silent  testimony  to  the  march  of  those  battalions  of 
America's  heroes  who  were  first  to  tempt  the  unknown 
in  a  land  that  once  seemed  God-despised. 

Forgotten  graves— dug  in  the  sand  and  alkali  that 
lightly  covers  the  great  inland  Western  states,  whose 
priceless  foundations— sunken  far  into  the  bowels  of 
the  earth,  thousands  of  feet  below  the  drab,  sad-col 
ored  soil— were  laid  by  the  gnomes  in  those  aeons 
when  the  world  was  being  created  in  marvelous  ways. 
And  the  gnomes  quarried  huge  masses  of  solid  sil 
ver,  and  hewed  and  cut  them  cunningly,  fashioning 
them  into  great  polished  cubes.  These  they  laid  for 
the  far  Western  states  to  rest  upon.  And  the  blocks 
were  cemented  together  with  mortar  made  of  molten, 
shining  gold.  Then  over  it  all  they  spread  the  sand 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


119 


and  the  soil  and  hid  their  handiwork,  leaving  it  for 
man  to  uncover  in  the  ages  to  come,  when  on  these 
foundations  he  should  upbuild  the  States. 

Up  and  down  the  valleys,  never  resting,  the  whirl 
winds  go — those  dancing  dervishes  of  the  Desert. 
They  blow  the  sands  hither  and  thither,  back  and  forth 
unceasingly,  as  they  spin  giddily  around  year  after 
year  in  their  mad  dance.  Sometimes  ^it  seems  as  if  they 
have  almost  brushed  aside  the  sands  and  bared  the 
foundations  of  these  Silver  States— these  States  of 
Gold.  But  a  stronger  whirlwind  comes  hurrying  up 
the  valley  and  buries  the  treasure  deep  again. 

The  little  winds,  as  they  go  spinning  on  tiptoe  round 
and  round  and  round,  until  you  are  dizzy  with  the 
watching,  whirl  fast  and  mad;  but,  whirl  as  they  will, 
whirl  they  never  so  madly,  they  are  not  strong  enough 
to  blow  the  sands  away.  And  the  people  go  back 
there  to  the 

" tending  of  cattle  and  tossing  of  clover; 
the  grazing  of  cattle  and  growing  of  grain," 
in  those  places  where  Nature  helps  them  make  another 
oasis ;  and  they  will  tell  you  that  they  are  waiting  for  a 
wind  that  is  in  leash  now;  a  great  wind  that  will  come 
out  of  the  East. 

Long  they  have  watched  and  waited,  and  the  sands 
are  not  yet  blown  away.  Still  they  hope,  as  we  all 
hope  for  the  thing  our  heart  leans  to;  and  they  will 
tell  you  that  surely,  some  day,  the  East  wind  will 
come,  sent  by  a  power  that  will  say,  as  it  speeds  it  on 
its  more  than  a  thousand  miles  of  journeying  over 
mountain,  and  upland,  and  plain:  '  "Qo,  blow  the 
sands  aside!  brush  them  away,  that  the  States  may 
be  built  up  from  the  foundations  which  the  gnomes 
laid!" 

These  are  the  things  they  will  tell  you.    Are  they 


Graves 
of 
the 
Desert. 


120 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Graves 
of 
the 
Desert* 


right,  or  are  they  wrong?  Are  they  prophets,  or  only 
men  who  pray?  Do  they  see  into  the  future,  or  are 
they  but  dreamers?  Who  knows? 

But,  all  the  while  the  whirlwinds  are  tossing  the 
sands  about,  and  uncovering  and  covering  over  again 
the  dead  men's  bones— men  who  made  a  way  across 
States  that,  unknown  to  them,  were  built  upon  foun 
dations  of  precious  metals.  And  those  who  faltered 
and  fell  by  the  way  in  their  quest  for  gold  as  they 
struggled  to  push  on  to  California— California  by  the 
sea — little  dreamed  of  the  wealth  beneath  their  feet. 

They  strung  themselves  out—a  living  thread— across 
the  plains,  over  half  a  hundred  years  ago;  today  the 
engine's  whistle  shrieks  from  shore  to  shore.  Progress 
provides  us  the  luxuries  of  the  modern  mode  of  travel, 
and  in  journeying  westward  from  States  far  beyond 
the  Rocky  Mountains'  jagged  ridge,  here  and  there, 
after  entering  that  vast  tract  which  belongs  to  the 
great  West,  looking  from  the  windows  of  the  Pullman 
sleeper  one  may  see  faint  traces  of  an  old  wagon  road 
running  parallel  with  the  railway's  double  line  of 
steel.  It  is  not  the  road  which  is  nearest  the  track — 
that  is  the  newer  road  made  by  a  newer  people— but 
the  old  one  traced  there  by  the  emigrants  of  fifty 
years  ago,  in  their  half  a  twelvemonths'  journey 
across  the  Great  American  Desert.  At  first  one  does 
not  see  it;  the  track  is  not  visible  in  the  grass-covered 
Nebraska  soil,  when  the  train,  after  crossing  the  great 
river  at  Omaha,  puts  behind  it  all  things  having  a  like 
ness  to  the  East. 

Looking  from  the  window  as  one  rushes  by,  he  sees 
bits  of  a  rolling  plain,  where— here  and  there— tall 
and  scattered  trees  having  the  semblance  of  gray 
ghosts  in  the  late  afternoon  light,  go  hurrying  across 
the  landscape,  their  slender  branches  outlined  against 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


127 


a  gold  and  glowing  horizon,  where  red  and  fiery  piled- 
up  clouds  fill  full  the  western  sky.  Long  stretches 
of  shallow  water,  left  by  late  rains,  glisten  amidst  the 
growth  of  tall  grasses,  and  in  the  reedy  places— 
shaded  by  bush  and  tree— are  grouped  great  flocks  of 
ducks  that  in  the  fading  daylight  seem  of  a  velvety 
blackness— scenes  to  thrill  the  heart  of  a  hunter  and 
charm  the  eye  of  an  artist.  Then  the  dusk's  gray 
mantle  drops  slowly  down  and  spreads  over  the  sleep 
ing  world.  Night  has  come— night  on  the  plain— ere 
one  has  noted  its  approach,  the  while  the  train  is  rush 
ing  on  into  the  darkness  and  the  Western  land. 

On  and  on  till  the  dawning  of  day;  on  and  on 
throughout  the  long,  hot,  dusty  daylight  hours;  each 
revolution  of  the  wheels  of  the  mighty  creature  whose 
sinews  are  of  steel,  and  whose  blood  is  of  fire,  has 
plunged  one  farther  and  farther  into  that  vast  land 
which  was  once  but  the  land  of  sand  and  sage,  and 
of  silence.  Human  progress  has  plowed  and  planted 
here  and  there,  civilization  has  made  grain  to  grow 
in  many  of  the  waste  places,  and  has  garnered  where 
once  was  but  the  illimitable  Desert. 

Cities  have  sprung  up  out  of  the  once  silent  plains, 
and  a  hundred  thousand  homes  of  the  living  now  line 
the  great  pathway  which  was  marked  out  by  the  skele 
tons  of  the  dead. 

Half  a  century  ago  it  was  the  land  of  the  dried-up 
alkali  lakes;  of  the  far-reaching  sage;  of  the  biting, 
white  dust;  of  the  ever-beckoning  mirage;  of  the 
strangely  slender,  cloud-touching  whirlwinds  which 
come  writhing  and  winding  and  twisting  their  way 
up  the  valley  to  meet  you,  and  greet  you  with  a  whis 
per  of  unknown  things,  and  then  pass  on,  twisting  and 
swaying  and  whirling,  to  mingle  with  the  mystery  of 
the  Desert. 


Craves 
of 
the 
Desert* 


122 


In   Miners9  Mirage-Land 


Craves 
of 
the 
Desert, 


Into  this  land,  more  than  fifty  years  ago,  an  army 
of  heroes  voyaged.  Across  the  dried-up  sea,  whitened 
by  salt  and  alkali,  their  Desert-ships  drifted  on  and 
into  the  farther  West.  The  courage  that  was  theirs 
to  dare  the  dangers  they  met  upon  the  way,  the  hard 
ships  they  encountered  and  endured,  have  passed  into 
the  great  volumes  of  unwritten  history. 

We  know  of  the  many  who  reached  Pacific  shores,  but 
who  can  count  those  who  died  like  that  other  weary 
traveler  of  whom  a  loving  brother  wrote:  "He  lay 
down  by  the  wayside;  and  using  his  burden  for  a  pil 
low,  fell  into  that  dreamless  sleep  that  kisses  down  his 
eyelids  still."  Time  is  levelling  the  cairns  which  mark 
their  resting  places,  and  those  mile-stones  of  their 
great  and  awful  journey  are  being  scattered  and  de 
stroyed. 

Along  the  road  marked  out  by  their  slow-moving 
ox-teams,  which  stretched  its  weary  way  from  the 
Missouri  river  to  the  Sacramento,  the  graves  of  those 
who  fell  by  the  roadside  marked  its  course.  Even 
unto  this  day  the  old  road  is  traceable,  although  but 
little  used.  Not  everywhere  may  it  be  seen  from  the 
car  windows;  for  in  some  places  the  railroad  leaves  it 
miles  and  miles  away  to  the  right  or  left.  Yet,  through 
that  vast  plain  lying  between  the  Rockies  and  the 
Sierras,  one  sometimes  sees  it  close  beside  the  track 
for  a  long  distance;  then,  to  avoid  a  grade,  it  winds 
around  a  rise  in  the  plain  and  disappears. 

The  railroad  has  cut  a  tunnel  through  the  rise,  and 
where  the  ground  is  levelled  it  has  laid  its  traek  of 
pine  and  steel;  but  in  those  long  past  days  no  shovel 
was  struck  into  the  earth,  save  to  hollow  out  the  shal 
low  graves  wherein  were  laid  away  the  bones  of  those 
who  are  asleep  in  the  Sahara  of  America. 

Wherever  these  graves  are  found— if  it  be  in  a  lo- 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


cality  where  there  are  rocks  about — one  will  see  that 
they  are  heaped  with  stones.  After  the  soil  had  been 
scraped  into  a  long1,  low  mound — the  one  form  into 
which  earth  is  shaped  to  wear  the  sign  of  pathos— 
stones  were  closely  piled  upon  it  to  keep  the  dear  dead 
from  the  ghouls  of  the  Desert;  for  coyote  and  badger 
alike  disinterred  them  unless  they  were  protected  in 
this  way. 

So,  if  you  will  do  as  I  have  done,  and— in  the  sad 
dle—ride  over  mile  after  mile  of  the  old  emigrant  road 
where  it  winds  in  and  out  among  the  gullies  along  the 
foothills,  or  where  it  dips  further  down  into  the  low 
lands,  or  as  it  trails  along  the  mesa,  or  stretches  out 
straight  across  the  hard,  alkali  flats;  or  where  it  fol 
lows  the  banks  of  the  muddy  Humboldt,  crossing  and 
recrossing  the  bends  where  the  old  fords  are,  you  will 
surely  chance  upon  some  long-neglected  mounds  which 
tell  their  silent  stories  of  the  sufferings  and  privations 
of  those  whose  names  must  forever  remain  unknown. 
Sometimes  a  roughly-lettered  board  was  placed  at  the 
head,  but  oftener  it  was  "a  grave  without  tombstone 
or  token/  The  new  years  of  this  century  find  very 
nearly  all  of  the  boards  fallen  or  lost.  Even  the  piled- 
up  stones  are  being  scattered.  The  graves  are  suf 
fering  the  neglect  which  comes  to  all  forgotten  things ; 
perhaps  many  of  these  dead  men  were  themselves  for 
gotten  two-score  years  ago. 

"None  come  who  knew  them.  There  are  none  to  say 
Where  lived  they,  whom  loved  they,  ere  they  passed 

away. 

They  sleep  with  none  to  marvel  o'er  them,  save 
Some  stranger  musing  by  the  sunken  grave." 

Riding  along  the  road  one  day,  where  it  winds  its 
way  down  the  valley  of  the^Humboldt,  I  came  upon 
two  half-hidden  graves.  They  were  just  above  the 


Graves 
of 
the 
Desert. 


124 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


Craves 
of 
the 
I  esert* 


river  bank,  near  an  old-time  emigrant  ford.  The  head 
boards  had  rotted  and  fallen;  the  sagebrush— tall  and 
thick— hid  them  from  the  passer-by.  The  brief  in 
scription  told  but  little: 

John  Knudson, 
died  Sept.  13th,  1854, 

aged  43  years. 
From  La.  Co.,  Wis. 

The  words  had  been  cut  in  a  small  board,  evidently 
part  of  some  box  taken  from  their  scanty  store,  and 
then  nailed  across  the  top  of  another  narrow  piece. 
It  had,  no  doubt,  once  been  set  firmly  in  the  ground. 
A  bit  of  board  had  also  been  at  the  foot;  but,  like  the 
other,  it,  too,  had  broken  off  and  fallen.  The  other 
grave  bore  these  words— cut  clearly,  and  with  great 
care— on  the  little  headboard: 

John  Walling, 

Died 

by  drowning 
September  1st,  1859. 

Aged  28  years. 

The  lettering  in  the  storm-stained,  weather-checked 
wood  had  been  cut  so  beautifully  true  and  even  that 
one  is  certain  that  it  was  the  work  of  someone  to  whom 
the  dead  man  was  dear;  for  only  loving  hands  could 
have  been  so  painstaking.  The  graves  were  sunken; 
bhe  stones  were  scattered.  I  went  away;  and  when 
I  came  again  it  was  to  bring  some  one  to  re-set  the 
boards  at  head  and  foot,  and  with  a  shovel  heap  the 
earth  into  the  shape  it  bore  when  other  hands  than 
strangers'  had  done  the  same  office  for  the  dead  forty 
years  before. 

Who  were  they?  Were  any  of  their  kindred  with 
them  when,  with  their  journey  but  half  done,  they 
stepped  aside  from  the  trail  made  by  the  path-finders 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


of  the  West,  to  stay  in  the  barren  valley,  while  the 
others  went  on  to  the  land  of  promise  t>y  the  Golden 
Gate?  Or  did  they  leave  wives  and  children  far  be 
hind  them  in  the  safer  East,  while  they  braved  the 
perils  of  the  plains  to  reach  the  land  of  gold  for  the 
sake  of  the  wealth  they  would  find,  and  all  the  great 
and  good  things  it  would  bring  to  the  dear  ones  at 
home?  Or  did  mothers  and  children  mourn,  and  won 
der  at  the  silence;  and  so  die  with  their  questioning 
ever  unanswered?  Who  is  there  that  dare  say  what 
that  silence  meant  to  them? 

These  are  but  two  among  the  many  hundreds  barred 
along  the  route  of  the  old  emigrant  road;  and  how 
pitifully  alike  would  be  the  histories  of  their  trials  by 
the  way,  could  we  but  know  them  all ! 

Almost  all  of  these  graves  are  nameless;  yet  in  this 
valley  there  is  at  least  one  that  bears  a  name,  and  is  a 
grave  well  known.  It  bears  the  name  of  "Lucinda 
Duncan"  upon  a  large,  white  cross,  erected  by  the 
railway  company  when  its  roadbed  was  being  made 
ready  for  the  rails  more  than  thirty  years  ago.  It  is 
"The  Maiden's  Grave/'  near  Beowawe;  and  they 
placed  the  cross  above  the  young  girl  sleeping  in  the 
valley,  ere  they  passed  on. 

But  the  names  of  the  dead  lying  in  the  numberless 
graves  are,  for  the  greater  part,  unknown;  and  age  and 
sex  can  only  be  vaguely  guessed  at. 

Here  is  one  who  was,  perhaps,  the  captain  of  his 
caravan;  a  beloved  leader  of  the  men  who  manned 
some  Desert-ship.  How  disheartened  the  survivors 
were  when  they  had  lain  him  away  and  had  to  push  on 
under  the  burning,  blistering  skies  without  the  com 
panionship,  the  leadership,  or  the  cheering  encourage 
ment  of  their  trusted  guide!  Their  ship  was  without 
a  captain  or  pilot  in  this  sea  of  gray,  shoreless  sand. 


Craves 
of 
the 
Desert* 


126 


In  Miners9  Mirage-Land 


Craves 
of 
the 
Desert, 


Could  they  carry  it  safely  into  port?  they  asked.  And 
we,  half  a  hundred  years  later,  wonder— did  they? 

Here  is  a  smaller,  shorter  grave,  that  holds,  perhaps, 
the  remains  of  some  youth,  hopeful  and  enthusiastic  in 
his  first  venture  into  a  new  life;  impatient  at  the  slow 
pace  of  the  weary  oxen,  dragging  the  wagons  so  few— 
so  very  few— miles  each  day  toward  the  golden  West 
he  was  so  eager  to  reach. 

Or  perhaps  it  might  have  been  a  woman;  one  of 
those  brave  souls  who,  cleaving  to  the  men  of  her 
household,  left  behind  her  all  the  dear  associations  of 
a  lifetime  to  enter  upon  a  new  experience,  and,  hand 
in  hand  with  father  or  hunband  or  son,  went  out  into 
the  unknown  new  country  to  share  the  work,  the 
sickness  or  the  dangers  of  the  uncertain  venture.  No 
fear  of  the  savages,  who  crept  down  upon  many  a 
one  and  left  the  victim  murdered  and  mutilated  by 
the  road;  no  fear  of  disease  that  might  claim  them 
before  the  journey's  end;  no  fear  of  any  of  the  perils 
which  made  more  than  one  man  turn  back  before  the 
journey  had  well  begun,  could  keep  these  women  from 
joining  their  dear  kindred  in  the  six  months'  march 
that  reached  almost  from  sea  to  sea.  0  men,  men !  how 
little  you  know  the  place  you  hold  in  the  hearts  of  the 
women  who  love  you ! 

There  were  many  such  grand  and  loyal  women  who 
went  out  beyond  the  pale  of  civilization,  whose  pres 
ence  helped  their  men-folk  onward,  whose  bravery 
spurred  them  forward  to  reach  their  golden  goal,  when 
heart-sick  and  weary  they  would  have  given  up  the 
struggle  in  despair. 

These  men  were  brave;  yet  there  were  times  when 
courage  failed  them.  As  their  hopes  of  reaching  the 
sea  faded  in  the  face  of  unforeseen  dangers  met  on 
the  way,  and  they  came  to  feel  that,  after  all,  the  earth 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


the 


was  only  a  place  in  which  to  dig  graves,  these  women 
lifted  them  up  with  hopeful  words  and  helpful  deeds  Cravev 
and  carried  them  through  to  the  end. 

Here  is  a  tiny  mound  of  stones;  "a  little  grave,  a 
little,  little  grave,  an  obscure  grave."  What  this  one 
holds,  we  know.  But  no  one  can  ever  guess  the  anguish  Desert 
of  that  mother  who  laid  her  baby  here,  nor  how  she 
suffered  as  she  looked  backward,  ever  backward,  as 
the  ox-teams  carried  her  away.  Before  that  day,  she 
had  complained  because  the  oxen  went  so  slowly;  but 
afterward  their  pace  was  never  slow  enough.  Every 
step  was  making  the  tiny  mound  grow  fainter  to  her 
sight,  as  the  journey  was  resumed,  when  the  wee  little 
one  had  been  lain  away.  How  she  looked,  and  looked, 
back  to  the  place  where  they  had  halted  a  day!  And 
as  she  looked,  she  kept  whispering  to  herself:  " To 
morrow  I  shall  not  be  able  to  see  it  at  all."  Backward, 
all  the  while  backward,  did  she  turn  her  face  to  the 
spot  where  "baby"  was;— the 'little  child  that  was  yet 
too  young  to  have  another  name.  The  mother  forgot 
then  that  she  had  ever  looked  forward.  Oh,  how  fast 
the  oxen  went!  If  they  would  but  go  slower,  so  that 
she  could  see  the  little,  low  mound  in  the  Desert  a  while 
longer!  It  seemed  to  her  that  all  those  great  stones 
they  had  piled  there,  had  been  heaped  upon  her  heart— 
her  poor,  bruised  heart— because  of  the  load  there  that 
was  so,  so  heavy.  All  her  life  long  her  heart  would 
ache,  her  whole  body  would  throb  with  pain— wrists 
and  palms  and  finger-tips— with  the  intensity  of  her 
longing  to  know  once  again  the  sound  of  its  voice,  the 
sight  of  its  face,  the  touch  of  its  satiny,  rose-leaf  hands. 
Oh,  to  know  again  the  thrilling  touch  of  soft,  warm, 
baby  fingers  laid  upon  her  check— the  touch  of  moist 
baby  lips  laid  against  her  breast ! 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


,  .  ives 
of 
the 
Desert* 


Never  again !  She  was  going  alone  out  of  the  Desert 
—out  of  the  Valley  of  Death;  going,  and  away  back 
there  by  the  roadside  she  had  left  a  little  grave. 

Graves— graves— graves ;  how  many  there  are!  They 
are  scattered  all  along  the  roadside  from  the  far-away 
East  to  the  farthest  West ;  and  yet  not  all  who  died  on 
the  old  emigrant  road  received  burial.  The  bodies  of 
many,  pierced  by  Indian  arrows,  never  found  sepulture, 
but,  scalped  and  mutilated,  were  left  by  savage  hands 
to  the  birds  and  coyotes,  their  bones  bleaching  there 
in  the  sun  year  after  year. 

Forgotten  and  neglected  graves  of  the  Desert!  For 
more  than  fifty  years  they  have  been  a  part  of  that  vast 
silence ;  visited  only  by  the  snows  of  winter  or  the  rays 
of  the  burning  summer  sun.  No  one  comes  to  mourn 
them.  None  come  to  lay  flowers  above  their  dead. 

The  afternoon  sun  goes  down,  shooting  arrows  of 
fire  into  the  heavens,  above  a  banner  of  crimson  and 
gold.  A  curtain  of  blood-red  grandeur  fringed  with 
flame  is  flung  athwart  the  west  in  the  magnificence  of 
a  Desert  sunset— the  like  of  which  is  not  seen  elsewhere 
in  all  the  world — and  as  the  sun  sinks  lower  and  lower 
behind  the  purple  mountains,  heaven  above  and  earth 
beneath  are  all  aglow  with  color.  The  sun's  rays 
touch  the  highest  peak  of  the  range  that  guards  the 
eastern  side  of  the  valley,  and  the  snow-covered  crest 
thousands  of  feet  above  is  crowned  by  the  dying  sun 
with  a  diadem  of  more  than  regal  splendor. 

Slowly  the  wonderful  light  spreads  over  the  land 
scape,  changing  the  foot-hills  to  ruby,  and  the  valley  to 
rose,  with  an  indescribable  wealth  of  shading,  and 
seeming  to  make  every  bush  and  briar  burst  into  blos 
som  with  flowers  of  exquisite  beauty.  It  falls  with 
equal  glory  on  green  tree  and  gray  shrub;  on  the 


In  Miners'  Mirage-Land 


129 


clover-sweet  oasis  of  a  later  growth  and  the  Desert 
that  the  earth  knew  of  old.  And  down  near  the  river 
where  the  emigrant  road  runs,  where  are  the  graves 
of  emigrants  of  the  early  days,  where  the  graves  of 
Walling  and  Knudson  were  made,  the  lovely  light 
creeps  in  waves  of  pink  and  violet,  and  lines  that  are 
faintly  blue;  and  ere  the  night  comes,  Nature,  who 
never  forgets  her  children,  even  in  the  Desert's  soli 
tude,  though  man  forget  brother  man,  has  covered 
them  over  as  with  a  pall  of  beautiful  blossoms. 


Craves 
of 
the 
Desert, 


And  here  ends  "In  Miners'  Mirage-Land," 
as  written  by  Idah  Meacham  Strobridge, 
with  cover  design  and  chapter  decora 
tions  made  by  J.  Duncan  Gleason,  and 
published  by  the  Artemisia  Bindery,  which 
is  in  Los  Angeles,  California,  at*  the  Sign 
of  the  Sagebrush;  and  completed  on  the 
Nineteenth  day  of  August,  One  thousand 
nine  hundred  and  four.  v*  ^*  v* 


